The Asymmetrical Spirit
by Rabbitfoot
Summary: My friend and I were brainstorming what would happen if the Soul Eater/DP worlds combined by Danny meeting Death the Kid, and we decided that it could only end badly. Thus, this stupid story was born, and grew beyond its intended proportions. Pre-PP.
1. Arrival of Imperfection

Steps reverberated off the walls of the various houses lined up throughout the city. To any casual passerby, it would seem like the sound of a normal individual walking calmly through the city at night. But if one listened closer, they would realize something rather odd about the sound of the steps they heard: each one was exactly the same length, as was the spacing in between them. It sounded rather like an eerie metronome ticking in the silence.

"Isn't this fantastic?" mused the owner of the footsteps. "Everything is so precise and perfect. I should train everyone at Shibusen to walk like this. The clutter of sound in the hallways would disappear, bringing the world closer to ultimate perfection!"

A sigh could be heard, and then a female voice, despite that there was only set of footsteps. "You're being ridiculous again, Kid…"

The obsessive-compulsive boy who measured his footsteps was Death the Kid, the son of Shinigami, the guardian of Death City. Kid was a shinigami himself, and a skilled weapon meister who wielded twin guns due to the perfect symmetry having one gun in each hand provided. However, while they were weapons at first glance, these guns were actually two shape-shifting girls called the Thompson sisters, Liz and Patty, who assisted Kid and were his loyal partners in combat. They also had to put up with Kid's neurotic tendencies, much to Liz's dismay and Patty's amusement.

"Of course you would say that," Kid responded, "but there is no greater perfection in this world than symmetry, both in appearance and in sound. Return to your human shapes, you two, and I will give you a lesson in the art of walking perfectly."

"Goody! " giggled Patty, while Liz just sighed once again. With a flash of light, the two guns in Kid's hands morphed into the shape of two slender girls, one with a goofy grin plastered to her face, the other with a rather pained expression.

"Now," Kid lectured, "I'm going to begin walking once again, and I want you to mirror my steps and rhythms exactly. If I hear one step out of place, there will be problems. Understand?"

Liz groaned. "Why can't you just let us stay transformed and save us the trouble?"

Patty twirled lopsidedly on one foot. "Oh, come on, sis, it'll be fun!"

With a dangerous expression, Kid turned on Patty. "Your pirouette – it was all wrong! When you do it, you need to keep your hands above your head bent at the exact same angle, and make sure they are exactly the same distance from each other, too! Let me demonstrate." Kid mimicked Patty's dance-like spin, executing it far more precisely than Patty herself had done.

The girl merely grinned. "Look, Liz, Kid's a ballerina!"

Kid opened his mouth to reply to this, but closed it again when he suddenly was overcome with a very strange sensation. A seemingly unregistered and unwelcome presence other than his own was roaming Death City, but he couldn't sense any evil intention in the soul. "Liz, Patty," he commanded sharply, "forget the lessons for now. We can resume them later."

"Oh, joy," Liz muttered.

The shinigami ignored the comment. "I sensed something just then, and I want to investigate. It seems to be coming from above us. Revert back to your weapon forms, and we can go after it." He stretched out his palm, and from it emerged a skateboard patterned with skulls. This was Kid's main form of aerial transportation, and one that he could call on at any time.

"In the dark?" Liz wailed. "But it's creepy out here! I thought we were going home."

Kid ignored her. "Transform already. I don't have all night. I can't be out fighting while the moon is positioned slightly to the left of Shibusen; it has to be right in the center."

Liz moaned and transformed. Patty, who had already morphed into her weapon form, laughed. "I can't wait to see who the intruder is! Maybe it'll be someone friendly!"

Hopping onto his skateboard, Kid gazed into the sky. Where was the being he had sensed? Then he saw it – a faintly-glowing streak moving across the sky. With a smug nod, he took off from the ground, grasping both guns firmly in his palms. "I can't take that chance," he finally responded to Patty. "Fire at the intruder in eight… seven… six…"

"You just had to start with eight, didn't you…" Liz whispered to herself.

"Five, four, three…." He raised the guns to target the streak. "…Two, one, zero." A slight smile appeared on Kid's face as he savored the perfect symmetry of the number zero. With this promising thought in mind, he pulled the triggers of both guns at once. Bullets composed of his soul wavelength shot out and spiraled towards his target. One passed by, but the other hit the flying figure square-on, and a loud shout could be heard from far away. Then the intruder began to fall.

"Liz!" Kid snapped. "Why did you miss?"

"I can't help it," Liz said, mentally shuddering. "I'm so creeped out."

For a moment, it seemed like Kid would respond, but he merely stated, "Let's go pick up our target," and dropped the subject. He sliced through the night sky on his skateboard, wind whipping his asymmetrically-striped hair backwards. Around the spot where he had seen the intruder drop from the sky, he circled for a moment before spotting the silhouette of a figure lying facedown in one of the alleyways. "There," he said, as he lowered himself to the ground and leapt off neatly.

The first thing he noticed was that the intruder was a boy, and almost human-seeming. His spiky hair was unnaturally white and swept dramatically to one side, which disgusted Kid. His body was also still steaming slightly due to the shot from Patty's gun that had hit him, but Kid disregarded that. Also. Kid had to admit, however grudgingly, that the boy's jumpsuit was rather symmetrical. It was all black save for white boots, a white belt, and a white collar, but everything matched up on both sides. Kid nodded his approval.

The boy groaned as he tried to lift his head and turn it to face Kid. His bright green eyes, unnatural as well, widened when he saw Kid leaning over him. "Are… are you the one who shot me?"

"Huh?" For a moment, Kid was confused, forgetting why he had come. "Oh, yes, you're not registered here in Death City, and it's my duty to protect the city from intruders. However, it seems like you are a rather harmless ghost, and –"

There was a shrill scream. "A ghost? A _ghost?_ I knew this excursion could only lead to trouble! _PATTY!"_ Liz yelped as she jumped into her sister's arms.

Patty was merely amused, and set her sister down gently. "Aw, come on, sis, he's so innocent and squishy! See?" To prove her point, Patty leaned down next to the ghost boy and began prodding him in the face.

"…I rather wish you wouldn't," the boy responded in a slightly strained voice.

"Patty!" Kid ordered. "Get away from him. I still have some unfinished business to attend to."

An expression of anxiety plastered itself on the ghost's face, and Patty laughed. "'Kay! Are you going to punish him really bad?"

Kid smirked when he saw the boy swallow nervously. "As I was saying," he continued, pointedly avoiding the question as he began to pace back and forth.

_Step. Pause. Step. Pause._ The ghost couldn't help noticing how measured his attacker's footsteps were. Concentrating on the rhythm seemed to help calm his nerves. What would this black-haired boy with the strange yellow eyes and his quirky female posse do to him in his downed state? He could only wonder, and pray that they would hear reason. "Um, listen, my name's Danny Phantom, and I'm afraid there's been a misunderst–"

"I am Death the Kid," the shinigami interrupted, much to the boy's dismay. "I am a shinigami and I devote myself to protecting this city from intruders possessing malicious intentions. However, as I can see, you are merely a misguided ghost, and your outfit is extremely symmetrical. Therefore, I am almost ready to forgive you."

Danny couldn't believe what he was hearing. This boy – this "Death the Kid" – was willing to forgive him based on his jumpsuit? "…Uh, not to be rude, but what does symmetry have to do with anything…?"

There was a sharp intake of breath as Liz gasped. "Now he's done it!"

Kid wheeled around to face Danny, golden eyes blazing. "What does symmetry have to do with anything? _What does symmetry have to do with anything?_ Symmetry has to do with everything! Nothing in this world can exist to its full potential of perfection if it does not possess perfect symmetry. Let me show you." He proceeded to take a small notepad out of his pocket and a ruler.

Danny was speechless.

With a flourish, Kid opened the notepad, which had the number eight printed on the first page. "You see, my friend, the number eight is a beautiful and wonderful specimen. Not only can it be symmetrically divided this way," – he positioned the ruler, after some measuring, vertically through the exact center of the eight – "but it can also be divided horizontally and still maintain its natural perfection. Not like the numbers seven or nine, you see, which have no symmetry no matter how you draw the lines." He proceeded to illustrate both of these numbers with pictures and rulers, as if he were teaching a kindergartener.

"Perfection is what will eventually bring peace and an ultimately better world upon us. My dream as a perfect being, as a shinigami, is to bring perfection and symmetry to the entire world. Only in this way can everyone exist as flawless, exact entities, and only in this way can excellence be fully reached.

"I noted when I first saw your uniform that it demonstrated symmetry to a simple but effective degree, which I commend. You, my friend, could assist me in creating a better, flawless world. So now I hope you see why symmetry is important; without it, ultimate perfection and peace in the world could never exist!"

There was a painfully long silence, and then Danny spoke up hesitantly. "That's… that's all very well and all… but… you're not even quite symmetrical yourself," he said apologetically. "Your… your hair…the stripes…"

For a moment it seemed like Kid would attack Danny, and he braced himself against the ground. Then, the shinigami began to wail, and his expression became pathetic. "You're right, I'm a worthless individual! I agonize about this horrific truth every waking moment. Damn it, please, please just kill me…I just want to die!" Kid suddenly looked like he was about to burst into hysterical tears, and Danny, dreadfully wishing that he hadn't said a word, was flabbergasted.

"Kid!" Liz warned, hoping she could snap her meister out of it before he completely lost sight of the point of the excursion. "Remember what you're here for!"

To her relief, Kid straightened up and attempted to get himself together. "Ah… you're right, I need to calm myself down. Anyway, I apologize for any inconvenience the bullet might have caused to you, and I am willing to let you leave and roam the city freely if you wish… on one condition."

Feeling hopeless, Danny asked, "What condition?"

Another silence, then: "I would like you to let me brush your hair."

"…what?" Had he heard correctly?

Kid nodded. "Yes, you would be very symmetrical but for the fact that your hair swoops horribly to one side. It sickens me to the highest degree. I would like to brush it out so that every hair is in place and symmetrical."

Hardly daring to believe his luck despite how awkward that luck may be, Danny replied, "…that's all? Really? You just want to fix my hair? It's rather stubborn, you know…"

"I'm extremely patient," Kid countered, his face emotionless. "I once plucked Liz's eyebrows for a month so they would line up perfectly on her face. However, this looks like a more agreeable and manageable case. This should only take an hour or so at the most, and then I will let you go. Is this a deal?"

"Yes, definitely," Danny sighed, thankful. Despite being shot from the sky by what appeared to be a psychologically-warped individual, he had the distinct sense that he was getting off rather easy. Feeling slightly disturbed though overall mostly just relieved, Danny flipped over onto his back and struggled to his feet, wincing at the minor injury he had sustained by falling from the sky. "All right, go for it." When he got no response, he repeated, "I said, you can go ahead." Still nothing. Danny began to realize something was not right, and he turned to face Kid.

The shinigami was staring at Danny blankly, hairbrush in one hand and his other pointing accusingly at Danny. "No…" he whispered hoarsely.

"What?" The ghost boy was beginning to feel a sense of impending doom once again, and he did not like it. "What is it?"

"I was wrong," Kid hissed. "You are a sickening individual, a repulsive intruder, and an appalling person. I was wrong to not exterminate you from Death City at once. But now you will pay for what you've done!"

"Whoa, whoa!" Danny took a step back. "I didn't do anything, I'm sorry! What's the matter with you all of a sudden?"

Kid's eyes blazed. "You stand there looking at me with those pitifully glowing green eyes and you do not realize _what's wrong?_ Do you not realize what an inexcusable crime you have committed?"

Danny felt like he was in high school all over again – taking tests and having no idea what the answers were. It made him feel helpless and definitely not in control of the situation. "No… I don't…I'm sorry, Death the Kid, if I've done anything wrong that I'm not aware of, but I really don't know."

"_Look at yourself!_" Kid nearly screeched. "That horrendous logo definitely cannot be divided equally in anyway. How dare you hide it from me, as if I would not notice eventually?" The shinigami's voice was rising to dangerous levels, and his eyes sparked with a manic energy. "I cannot stand the sight of you any longer. Not even fixing your disgusting mop of hair could get you out of your sentence for this crime. To think I almost let you go unpunished…! _You are going to pay for this blasphemy! LIZ! PATTY! TRANSFORM! NOW!"_

Now he's done it, thought Liz as she and her sister morphed once again into the set of twin guns.

He's out of his mind, thought Danny. I've finally met someone in life who's not right in the head, and now he's after mine. I'm so dead.


	2. Criminal Somewhat Vanquished

Kid lunged forward faster than Danny had thought possible, and he barely had time to jump out of the way. Even with the attempted dodge, Danny was still clipped in the shoulder by Kid's guns, and he realized in that instant that the shinigami, even fighting while blinded by rage, was still far more skilled and powerful than Danny at his best. He would have to be careful – or extremely lucky – just to survive.

"I'm not sure this is a good idea," Liz suggested to Kid. "After all, he's not really doing anything wrong –"

"Shut up," Kid snapped, all elegance in his speech gone. "I'm going to destroy him and there's nothing you can do about it but help me."

There was a pause where Liz sighed and Patty giggled, then Liz replied, "All right, but you're going to have to focus."

The two boys faced each other in silence for a moment. Danny felt intimidated by Kid's murderous expression, while Kid seemed to be staring at the insignia on Danny's chest and muttering something repeatedly under his breath.

"You know," Danny suggested, "this symbol _can_ come off, if that's really all that's bothering you…"

The ghost boy's statement seemed to snap Kid out of his trance, and he looked up. "Yes, and I'm sure it will come off. Along with your head."

Danny swallowed. "Ah…"

With a deadly glint in his eyes, Kid rushed towards Danny, who pushed off the ground and took flight, hoping he could out-fly the shinigami. His hopes plummeted when he saw Kid, guns shining threateningly in both hands, hop on his skateboard once again as it rose into the sky.

If I can fly fast enough, Danny thought, I might be able to –

_Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!_

Danny yelped as a deadly shower of bullets shot out of the barrels of both guns and appeared to aim themselves as Danny's chest. In a moment of panic and knowing he couldn't escape the fast-flying projectiles, Danny made himself intangible. Despite this, the bullets each struck Danny in unison, sending spasms of electricity through his body; overcome by a wave of dizziness, he dropped several feet out of the air.

Kid's chuckling brought Danny back to his senses. "These are not normal bullets, my sadly lopsided friend. These bullets are made of my soul wavelength. Even if you try to dodge them, or have them pass through you, they will still track and hit you. There is no way you can escape."

"Kid," Liz warned. "Maybe you should stop lecturing and start paying more attention. He's returning fire!"

The shinigami had just enough time to frantically dodge a shower of ectoplasmic beams flying past his head. Once he realized he was being fired at, however, his evasive movements became far more calculated. He maneuvered through the blasts flawlessly, never being clipped in the shoulder, never faltering in his flight path. "Is that the best you can do?" he called out to Danny smugly.

Unfortunately for Danny, it was, and he couldn't carry on much longer. He had been struck twice by the strange bullets, and he could feel his strength and ghost powers faltering. Stopping his fire, he attempted to fly faster, but the burst of speed came a second too late, and another onslaught of bullets struck Danny, one after the other, until his vision blurred and he felt his ghost form slip away.

Kid watched the transformation with interest. "So he's a human as well? Hmm…"

"Are you going to spare him?" Liz asked hopefully. She was tired of fighting.

To her exasperation, Kid shook his head instantly. "Of course not, Liz. I can't let someone who has so violated the laws of symmetry and made a fool out of me live after this embarrassing fiasco. I can, however, put him out of commission and bring his unconscious body to Stein to study. That's a worse punishment than anything I could dish out myself."

Liz gulped. He had heard Spirit, Maka's father, complaining about Stein's midnight experiments many times. However, according to Spirit the experience was too horrific to talk about in great detail, and knowing Stein, too horrific to imagine. "He doesn't really seem so bad," she pleaded. "Come on, Kid, cut the boy some slack!"

Kid landed next to Danny's body and unceremoniously slung the ghost boy's unconscious, human body over his shoulder. "He was unauthorized to be here anyway, Liz. If you look at it one way, we're only doing our job."

"How about a compromise?" Liz asked frantically. "We can take him to Shinigami-sama and, since, you know, he wasn't on the list anyway, he can decide whether or not to… get rid of him. Okay?"

There was a painful silence, and Kid finally nodded. "But first…" He pulled out a pair of scissors. "I'm giving him a haircut."

"…Fine," Liz agreed grudgingly. "Whatever makes you happy."


	3. Kid's Interesting Father

Danny blinked into consciousness. He was lying on his back on a mattress and had no idea where he was. Then he remembered what had transpired, and sat bolt upright. Was he in prison? Was he injured in any way? He felt… lighter, somehow, but couldn't find the words to describe why. Otherwise, he felt sore, but unharmed.

"Ah, so you're awake," a jolly-sounding voice greeted him. "Welcome, ghost boy, to Death City!"

Danny looked up to see a shockingly odd figure staring down at him. He appeared to be something like a bizarre white skeleton wearing spiky black robes and a hat. Although Danny couldn't tell what his expression would have been had he had one, his voice seemed kind enough. "What happened? Why am I here? Where's… that Death the Kid boy?"

The skeleton figure laughed. "I'm Shinigami, the head of Death City. Don't worry about my son. He tends to be melodramatic, and overreacts to things sometimes."

"That's… _your son?_" Danny had to refrain from making a rude comment about the incongruity of that image. "But…he tried to kill me!"

Shinigami laughed. "He was merely under the impression that you were a malicious spirit attacking our city, and attacking you was a precaution."

Danny was a little confused. "Well, sort of…he was going to let me off, but then he went on some rant about symmetry and how perfection was the most important thing in the world…"

More laughter. "I'm sorry for the trouble, but that's just his character. He brought me to you so I could determine whether or not your soul was evil, and if he should dispose of you. It's obvious you're just a little lost and confused, though, so you're off the hook, and I made sure to give you proper protection in the city from now on."

Relieved, Danny stood up. "Thank you so much." Then, after an awkward silence, "Do you mind if I ask…?"

"Ask away," Shinigami interrupted him. "You're obviously new here and I wouldn't be surprised if you were baffled."

He nodded. "Yeah, I was wondering… so, you guys can see souls…?"

"With some practice, anyone can sense the souls of others," Shinigami replied. "Even you could someday. Which nicely segues to my next point of discussion. Since you do not seem to know anything about Death City, I have assigned Kid to be your escort for the time being. He can take you to Shibusen, a school where he is currently enrolled, along with other kids of around your age, and explain how it works to you so you can participate in the city's activities during your visit."

Unable to decipher any of that, Danny asked helplessly, "…Kid's going to be my escort…?"

To Danny, Shinigami's response made it sound like he was grinning. "He won't attack you again, I promise. Actually, he's waiting for you outside now, in the lobby. Oh, but first – I'd suggest going down the hall and taking the first door on the left. There's a spare outfit for you in there, and my son told me that if you did not change into it, he refused to escort you through the city."

"…Okay," Danny responded nervously. Shinigami sounded far more cheerful than Danny himself felt at the moment, but he would have to trust Kid's father for the time being. "Thank you so much," he added. "I think without you I'd be dead somewhere right now."

Shinigami chuckled. "Actually, you'd probably be… well, Kid had other plans. But you're very welcome! Tata!"

Other plans? Danny mentally cringed as he walked out of the room, closing the door behind him. Shaking it off, he traversed the hallway until he came to the room Shinigami had told him about. When he opened the door, he found that the room was empty save for a bed, a white suit-like uniform, and a mirror. While walking past the mirror in order to pick up the clothes from the bed, Danny gasped as he glimpsed his reflection, and swiveled around violently to face it. No wonder he felt lighter – his hair had been cut and styled to lay flat on both equal-length sides.

"Apparently he did fix my hair after all," Danny muttered to himself. "Well, this is weird." He then proceeded to put on the uniform that Kid had set out for him, despite that it made him feel extremely stiff. However, being stuck in his human form still made him feel rather vulnerable, so he morphed, experiencing yet another surprise when the white suit changed to black along with the transformation. "…This _is_ weird," he repeated.

Danny left the room and proceeded to poke around the mansion until he found the lobby where Kid was. The absolute symmetry of the place was unnerving, and he found himself shying away from walls and furniture in fear that he'd brush against something and it would move a millimeter to the right or left.

Eventually, he found the front door, as well as Kid himself, who was sitting motionlessly in the center of a sofa with his arms resting on his evenly-parted legs. On either side of him were two blonde girls in cowboy hats which Danny presumed to be the guns from the day before. One was staring into a handheld mirror looking discontent with something, while the other was drawing miscellaneous shapes in the air with her finger and occasionally giggling. When Kid saw Danny, he stood up gracefully, and both girls stood up in unison a second later, the long-haired one closing her mirror with a loud snap.

"Greetings," Kid stated, holding out his hand for Danny to take. "I apologize for the misunderstanding earlier. You will be happy to know that I think your appearance is much improved today. I see you are in your inhuman form again, which means you have probably rested quite enough. Now, come, or we will be even later to school than we are now."

What a non-apology, Danny grumbled in his head. To Kid, he asked, "Why, how late are we now?"

"An hour and a half," Kid replied emotionlessly.

"Oh, sorry about that," Danny said. "You must have been waiting for me to wake up…"

"Actually, I was busy straightening a painting in one of the guest rooms. That on its own took a little more than an hour in itself. It was skewed almost an inch to the right, you see. You'll be pleased to know that it looks much better now." Kid nodded as the long-haired twin rolled her eyes next to him. "Now, come with me, and you can pay everyone a visit Shibusen."

Dumbfounded, Danny could only comply.

"Don't worry," Liz said to him, placing a hand on his shoulder. "If you think Kid is weird, just wait until you meet the rest of them."

Danny glanced up at her. "And this is supposed to make me feel better how?"


	4. A Different Kind of School

Danny stood, gaping, at the doors of Shibusen. The school was more enormous than he could have ever imagined; the entrance was vaguely reminiscent of Shinigami's face enlarged on a much bigger scale, and the entire school reminded Danny of how small and insignificant he was.

Death the Kid had been explaining – in a condescending manner, of course – the basics of how the school worked as they walked. Apparently it was composed of pairs of weapons and meisters, who collected the souls of evil people off Shinigami's list. When ninety-nine regular souls and the soul of one witch had been collected by the weapon, the weapon could then evolve into a Death Scythe, which was far more powerful. However, the pairs of weapons and meisters had to work specifically well with one another, or, in other words, their "soul wavelengths" had to match. Most people worked in groups of two; it was rare that groups of one meister and two weapons – like Kid, Liz, and Patty – would exist, but their soul wavelengths matched up well enough for the three to work together. Danny couldn't see how anyone could work as a partner with Kid, since he was having enough trouble working with him as it was, but apparently Liz and Patty had grown up on the streets and were thus attracted to people of a higher class, like Kid, and were able to be open enough to him to support him through his often neurotic outbursts. To each their own, he supposed.

"Are you going to stand there all day or are you going to follow me in?" Kid asked impatiently. He was standing at the front door of the school, tapping his foot with obvious irritation.

Danny straightened up. "Sorry about that, I was daydreaming. Lead the way."

Mumbling something incoherent, Kid opened the doorway to the school and walked inside, Liz and Patty flanking him on either side. Danny followed him obediently. As they walked through the hallway, Danny's head turned constantly to gaze at the strange architecture and people.

"Kid!" a voice cried from the end of the hallway. "Who's that? Is that a guest? He better not make more of a commotion than me!" The owner of the voice, a conceited-looking boy with spiky blue hair, rushed up to meet them, trailed by a helpless-looking girl sporting a long black ponytail.

"He's just visiting," Kid replied. "This," he said "is –"

The boy interrupted him. "I can introduce myself! I am Black*Star! My greatness will surpass all someday, and I will even surpass God! This is my partner Tsubaki, and together we will rise above all mortals!" He grabbed Danny's hand with his own and shook it vigorously.

"…Good luck with that," Danny said, trying not to sound too sarcastic.

"I don't need luck!" Black*Star shouted. "I have skill, natural talent, and dashing good looks."

"…I'm so sorry about my meister," Tsubaki apologized, her expression suggesting that she was powerless and that this situation happened often. "He's a little… loud, and disregards others around him." She held out her hand for Danny to shake. "I know Black*Star said this already, but I'm Tsubaki. It's a pleasure to meet you. Are you a friend of Kid's?"

Danny wasn't sure how to reply to this. "In a sense, I suppose," he said finally. "I'm Danny Phantom. I got lost and ended up here in Death City somehow. Kid sort of, er, attacked me yesterday, because my uniform wasn't symmetrical, but now we're on semi-friendly terms. He's my escort." He took Tsubaki's hand and shook it, noticing that her grip was far less firm than Black*Star's aggressive handshake had been.

Tsubaki smiled. "I see. You actually look a bit like Kid, with the matching uniforms and all."

He groaned. "He told me if I didn't change into it and become more symmetrical, he wouldn't escort me around. I'm aware I look like a doofus."

She laughed. "It's okay, don't worry about it. Anyway, I wish you the best of luck on your trip here!"

"Who's that?" another female voice asked from behind Tsubaki. "Is he new?" Another girl emerged, with a boy Danny assumed to be her partner right behind her. The girl had green eyes and pigtails, while the boy had spiky white hair and slouched as he walked.

"Yeah, I'm just visiting," Danny said, tiresomely having to introduce himself once again. "My name's Danny Phantom, I'm, uh, half-ghost, and Kid is acting as my escort right now."

The girl nodded, not fazed in the slightest. "All right, then. I'm Maka and this is my partner, Soul."

"Nice to meet you," Danny said, refraining from making a confused comment about the name, and shook both their hands.

A noise that sounded a bit like rumbling began to approach the group, intensifying with each passing second, and Danny stared blankly at the man creating the noise, rolling towards them down the hall on a swivel chair. He had to be one of the most bizarre people Danny had ever laid eyes on. Everything about him appeared to be stitched together – his lab coat, the shirt underneath, even his face. Not only that, but his head appeared to have a giant screw sticking out of it. As he approached them, he appeared to be turning the screw and adjusting something, glasses flashing with every movement. To say that Danny was slightly intimidated would be an understatement.

"That's Dr. Stein," Tsubaki explained. "He's our teacher."

This wasn't what Danny had expected at all.

"He's also obsessed with dissecting things," Soul added, speaking for the first time. "Although he looks serious about something else right now. Hey, Stein, what's the matter?"

Stein attempted to stop his chair, but one of the wheels caught on something at the last second, and he was thrown out of his seat gracelessly. Tsubaki instinctively sidestepped out of the way, leaving Stein to plow into Danny and knock him over. Without stopping for an apology, Stein scrambled to his feet, leaving Danny dazed and wondering if the madness of Shibusen would ever end.

"You all are being called on to participate in an emergency mission," Stein began sharply.

"Yay, a mission!" Patty interjected cheerfully.

"…Apparently there's been some sort of invasion of creatures with evil souls, and they're terrorizing the entire city," Stein continued with some annoyance. "They came out of nowhere, because even Shinigami-sama hadn't noticed them to put on his list until now. We need you to exterminate them before they cause any more trouble."

Kid nodded. "What kind of creatures?"

Stein looked thoughtful. "We're not really sure… they all appear to be some kind of evil ghost… some kind of spirit."

"Ghosts?" Liz screeched. "We have to go fight _ghosts?_"

Danny suddenly felt guilty.

"That kid you just knocked over –" Soul said, finishing the sentiment that Danny, who was still in the process of rising from the ground, had been about to voice – "said he was a ghost. And he's new around here. And we're suddenly having some kind of weird spirit problem."

Not liking where this was going, Danny sighed. "You're right… this must be my fault. I'm sorry."

"Hmm," Stein said, but he was now staring at Danny with interest.

"Kid almost gave you that boy to experiment on!" Patty said with a broad smile.

Flinching, Danny turned to stare at Kid. That must have been what his "other plans" had been. From the sight of Stein, he could only assume that the experience, if Kid had gone through with it, would have been chilling. Kid merely shrugged apathetically.

"Hey, I'm not _sure_ if I caused this ghost invasion," he began hurriedly, attempting to ignore everyone's eyes fixed on him, "but if I did, I'm really sorry. Ghosts _do_ tend to go wherever I go."

"It doesn't matter whose fault it is," Maka said. "We just need to take care of it."

Black*Star looked at Danny with disdain. "I can't stand that you're getting so much attention from this!" he whined. "Let's go kick some ghostly butt! I'll lead the way, shining with the brilliant light of my own awesomeness!"

"W-wait a minute," Tsubaki pleaded. "Shouldn't we form a plan first?"

"Tsubaki would normally be right," Stein responded. "But in this case, there's not much of a plan we can form when a wave of spirits is heading right towards us. We just need to act, and fast."

"And I'll be the fastest acting of them all!" Black*Star shouted, running down the hall towards the door.

"Black*Star!" Tsubaki cried after him. "Wait up! I'm your weapon!" She dashed after him frantically.

There was a silence, then Maka spoke up again. "We should follow him." Murmurs of "Yes," and "Let's go!" were passed around, and the group, including Stein, followed.

Soon, the only ones left in the hallway were Kid, Liz and Patty, and Danny. The silence between them was stifling.

"Do things like this happen often?" Danny asked hesitantly. "I mean, obviously, based off your guys' reactions, massive ghosts attacks aren't common, but are you often called off on missions like this?"

Kid shrugged symmetrically. "Sometimes, I suppose. We go on missions anyway. That's our job." He paused, then added, "Usually, though, they aren't caused by people we know." With one last patronizing glance back at Danny, Kid began to walk forward. "You better come with us to help. This whole mess is probably your fault anyway. And if you mess up that suit or your hair in the battle, just know that there will be serious issues. Okay?"

"I suppose," Danny grumbled, following the shinigami despite himself.

"Don't mind him," Liz said, coming up from behind Danny and startling him. "He might seem pretty uppity at times, but he's a loyal friend and good person…mostly. You learn to get used to him after you fight with him for so long."

Danny nodded. He had a grudging respect for Death the Kid, despite his strange obsessions with things that appeared to be pointless to the rest of the world. His fighting skills were impressive, to say the least, and he seemed to have a strong sense for justice when he wasn't tying it to whether something was symmetrical. Plus, both of his partners seemed to like him, and they themselves seemed fairly normal.

"Kid's a weird guy," Patty laughed. "But he's entertaining! And that's why he's fun."

The ghost boy smiled. "You're right. The least I can do is help him, since he tries so hard to protect this place. Kid!" Danny called after the shinigami. "I'm coming with you to help fight the ghosts!" Everything had been happening so fast lately; he had gotten lost in Death City, nearly killed by someone who was now his escort, and had met several extremely interesting characters. But despite all this, he was trying as hard as he could to keep his head above water and manage. Now he had brought something of a chaotic disaster upon this place without meaning to, and he figured it was his duty to clean up the mess. After all, that was his job, right? To fight ghosts? He had even slipped the Fenton Thermos in his pocket when he switched uniforms. He was ready.

"Of course you are," Kid replied. "By the way, when you blink, your left eye closes a split second after your right. It's very unseemly. You might want to work on that."

Danny grinned. "Okay, thanks for the tip. I'll be sure to keep that in mind."

The two boys and the twins left the building to find the rest of the group – Black*Star, Tsubaki, Soul, Maka, and Stein – waiting for them. "Where have you guys been?" Black*Star demanded jokingly. "I've already exterminated all the ghosts and taken a walk around the city's entire exterior in the time it took you to leave the building! We've gotta pick up the pace already! Although I know that it's impossible for normal people to keep up with my greatness."

"Black*Star…" Tsubaki begged halfheartedly, but she was smiling.

Danny suddenly stiffened as a wisp of what appeared to be blue smoke escaped his mouth – his ghost sense. "There are a lot of ghosts coming," Danny said nervously. "I mean, like, maybe a hundred, maybe twice that. And they're headed right towards us!"

"You can sense souls?" Stein asked, curious.

He shook his head. "No, but I can definitely sense ghosts. And I'm sensing a _lot_ of them right now."

"Then what are we waiting for?" Soul demanded. "Come on, we've got to get to them before they destroy the school!" With a flash of light, he transformed into a huge, crescent-shaped scythe, patterned with a spiky red-and-black design. Tsubaki transformed into her weapon form as well, two small sickles connected by a large chain.

"Liz, Patty," Kid ordered. No more needed to be said, and the twins became guns once again.

"What's your weapon?" Danny asked Stein, feeling left out and oddly desperate to talk to someone, even thought Stein was bizarre.

"I don't have one," Stein replied. "I can fight using my soul wavelength alone as a weapon."

Although Danny didn't really know what was going on, he was still impressed. "You can do that?"

Stein grinned eerily. "Only if you're extremely skilled."

"Let's get moving!" Black*Star cried, running off into the streets with Tsubaki.

The rest followed suit, all traveling by foot, including Danny. As they got closer and closer to their target, those who could sense the ghosts – Danny, Kid, Stein, and Maka – became more troubled. The power was immensely great, and thus so was the threat to the city.

Maka sighed. Sometimes, she felt slightly envious of Soul and Black*Star, blithely charging into the situation with confidence brimming because they had no idea what lay ahead.

As the group neared a corner, they noticed that bright green lights appeared to be lighting up the alleyway in flashes. They appeared faintly at first, then intensified as the group neared them. No one was speaking; everyone was concentrating on the target ahead, and had too much adrenaline to say a word. The only sound was of their own breathing.

Black*Star, who was leading the group with Tsubaki , was the first to reach the ghosts. As they rounded the corner, Tsubaki gasped. "Oh God…"

The rest of the group followed suit, and one by one they were stunned to a halt. Viewing the sight in front of them, their feeling was mutual – winning this was definitely not going to be as easy as they thought.


	5. Ghost Swarm

The group had stumbled upon what appeared to be a swirling mass of ghosts that stretched so far into the sky that the end point could not be seen. Danny hadn't seen this many ghosts in once place since Pariah Dark's skeleton army, and consequently the rest of the Ghost Zone's inhabitants, had invaded Amity Park. Instinctively, his hand went to the Fenton Thermos inside his coat. He hesitated, unsure of whether to strike.

Maka, however, was faster. She lunged at the nearest ghost, swinging Soul in a broad arc around her head. The energy from her soul wavelength struck the ghost directly, and it dissipated.

"One down, thousands to go," Soul muttered. "This is not cool."

Everyone else seemed to take this as a cue, and began pummeling as many ghosts as they could. Kid was firing soul wavelength bullets in a frenzy, Black*Star clipped them with both sides of Tsubaki's weapon form, and Stein shot bolts of his soul wavelength at them as fast as he could. Danny, meanwhile, was sucking all of the weakened ghosts into the Fenton Thermos while shielding himself from further assault. It was a hectic mass of attacks, and although the group managed to exterminate a large number of the ghosts, the ghouls seemed to keep coming at them endlessly. It was difficult to keep up when the enemy as a whole system never sustained permanent damage, and after a while everyone began to tire, even Black*Star.

"We can't keep this up forever," Stein yelled over the fighting, voicing what was on all their minds. "Danny, where are they all coming from? If we could prevent more of them from coming, maybe we could put an end to all this."

"I'm not sure," he shouted back, but at the same time a glint in the sky near the top of the ghostly tornado caught his eye. "Wait, I might have just seen a portal up there. They might be coming out of that!"

"Don't just stand there, then!" Stein called, disregarding the fact that Danny was floating. "Go close the portal and we'll finish this!"

Danny nodded and shot upward, dodging blows from the ghoulish attackers as he ascended. Close to the top of the cloud of ghosts, a cloud that stretched about two-hundred feet into the air, he could see what appeared to be a neon green slash in the sky, as if Wulf had cut a portal here from Walker's prison in the Ghost Zone.

Something sparked in Danny's memory, but faded as soon as it had come. What had happened? Why was he even here? He couldn't recall how he had arrived in Death City in the first place. Maybe something had wiped his memory of that particular moment in time…

A punch in the side of the head brought Danny back to his senses. He had to focus and close the portal in order to save Death City and Shibusen.

But what if that portal was the only way he could get back home?

There was no time to think about that now. Everyone was in danger. Kid, Liz, Patty, Tsubaki, Stein and the rest were all counting on him. For now, he would have to disregard his personal best interests and focus more on the big picture.

With a burst of determination and speed, Danny shot towards the rip in the sky where ghosts were pouring out like blood from a wound. If he could just push past the congealed mass of spirits, he could get to the portal. But they snatched at him with their hands, pulling him back regardless of how hard he struggled. It was hopeless – he couldn't get through.

"Pump-pumpkin, pumpkin, Halloween cannon!"

A shrill voice pierced through the air, and an orange blast cut through the mass of spirits. Instantly, the pressure on Danny let up, and he, not questioning his savior, was able to squirm free, heading towards the slash in the air. When he reached it, he peered through the opening and found himself gazing at the swirling purple and green scenery of the Ghost Zone.

With a sinking feeling, Danny realized he had no idea how to close it. It was unfortunate that Wulf wasn't there to close it himself.

Tentatively, he stuck his hand through the portal and felt around, discovering to his surprise that the edges of it were rather like fabric. Taking this into consideration, he deduced that the simple solution was that they could possibly just be pulled shut. Grabbing both sides of the slash, he forcefully brought them together as if they were curtains, erasing all traces of its green glow from the sky.

Below Danny, the rest of the group was weakening the remaining ghosts. The understanding that no more were coming seemed to invigorate them, and they attacked with twice as much force as before. With a few final sweeps of the Fenton Thermos, Danny was able to capture and contain the rest of the ghosts, until the day was silent once again. Tsubaki, Soul, Liz, and Patty had all morphed back into their human forms, and it was obvious that everyone was utterly spent of energy.

"We won!" Black*Star shouted unnecessarily. "Although technically I won, because I did the most!"

Everyone was too exhausted to argue with him, so they rolled their eyes.

Danny, still hovering high in the air, was thoughtful, mind swirling with questions. What had just occurred? More importantly, who was behind it? Those were all low-level ghosts, and they wouldn't have been able to rip through the Ghost Zone into Death City without help. Had someone kidnapped Wulf, and were they using his powers to commit evil deeds again? If so, Danny was worried. Wulf was one of the few ghosts that Danny considered a friend, and he would hate for something to have happened to him.

"Nyaaaa!"

Danny yelped as someone grabbed him from behind. In surprise, he whipped around, freeing himself from the embrace, and instinctively blasted whoever it was with an ectoplasmic energy beam.

"Oww…" the voice wailed, giving Danny second thoughts.

When the bright light from the blast had cleared, Danny saw, to his discomfiture, that the person he had just attacked was a rather scantily-clad young woman with swirly purple hair and what appeared to be the attire of a witch. She was pouting and rubbing her eyes as if she were crying. "Blair was just trying to help you out," she said miserably, "and even gave you a hug after you all won, but in return, you hit me! You're so mean."

"You were the one who helped me during the battle?" Danny asked with some disbelief. "Oh, I'm sorry about that, you, er, you just startled me." He was trying incredibly hard to keep his composure and not stare, and was also desperately wishing that he was conversing with someone…more clothed.

She smiled sweetly. "I forgive you, nyaa!" Before Danny could back away, the woman threw her arms around his neck and gave him a kiss on the cheek. He could feel his face grow hot with embarrassment.

"That's Blair," Danny could hear Stein call from down below. "She's a cat with magic powers."

_A cat?_

"You know her?" Danny squeaked, desperately wishing she would let go of him. Imagine if Sam saw me right now, he thought wretchedly. How would I ever be able to explain this? "Blair," he began awkwardly, "I, er, I really need to get down. Would you, uh, mind maybe… letting go of me?"

With a "Hmph!", Blair let go of Danny's neck and leapt away onto what appeared to be a floating pumpkin several feet away in the sky. Relieved, Danny flew down to rejoin the others as quickly as possible. Stein was smirking at him, which only added to Danny's mortification.

"Don't let her cute demeanor fool you," Maka muttered. "She's really obnoxious and flirts with everyone."

Before Danny could respond to that, Blair alighted on the ground next to him and jumped on his back, knocking him over and pinning him to the ground. "Don't listen to Maka," Blair crooned. "I think you and I are going to be…" She leaned in and put her mouth to his ear, whispering. "…really close friends."

At that moment, Danny really wanted to die.

"You look like an idiot," Death the Kid droned, snapping Danny back to his senses. "Kick her off and we can head back to the school already."

Danny looked back up at Blair, wishing her face wasn't so close to his. "Uh, I need to get up. So… please get off me?"

Blair giggled and complied.

With a sigh of relief, Danny jumped up from the ground and brushed himself off. "So!" he continued a little too loudly. "That was successful. …Let's get out of here."

He began the walk back to Shibusen, attempting to ignore the amused chuckling of Black*Star and Soul behind him.


	6. Liz Attempts to Help

Danny lay back in bed. It had been a long day, and, as odd as it was to think this, he was actually thankful to be back in Kid's mansion.

When the group had returned to Shibusen, Shinigami and Stein had questioned Danny for a while about what he knew. Unfortunately, Danny had to tell them the truth: He had no recollection of why he had arrived there, and even less of an idea as to why there where ghosts invading the city. Although Shinigami had accepted this, Stein continued to prod for more information about the situation, and then about the ghost boy himself, until Danny began to wonder whether Stein was genuinely trying to be helpful or if he was trying to interrogate him as part of some experiment. Fortunately, the official school day ended before Stein was able to get anywhere with his questioning, and Danny rejoined Kid with some relief before the two headed to Kid's home once again.

When they returned, Danny remembered something else, finally. Whatever amnesia he had been plagued with appeared to be wearing off slowly, and he seemed to recall what he had been doing the day he disappeared. It had been an exhausting day of school from beginning to end, starting off because he was late to his first period class. Mr. Lancer had reprimanded him for his tardiness in front of everyone, and since Danny had no excuses (how was he supposed to tell his teacher he had been dealing with ghosts as he flew to school?), he had had to take it. Dash had been snickering at him the entire time, and if his secret identity hadn't been at stake, Danny would have loved to blast the smirk right off his face.

That day, Danny had arrived home with what seemed like more homework than usual. Jazz, in her usual overbearing way, had offered to help him with his math, but Danny hadn't been in the mood to deal with her. He knew and had accepted a long time ago that he was stupid; he didn't need someone else far more intelligent than him to confirm that.

After the memory of shooing his sister from the room, though, he couldn't remember a thing. He had probably started working on homework, but if he had, he couldn't recall any specifics. The next thing he could remember was his confused and lost flight over Death City.

He sighed. How was he supposed to get to the bottom of anything if all he could remember were pointless details? _Every_ day was tiresome. _Every_ day brought more homework than he wanted to deal with. _Every_ day it was harder and harder to conceal his secret identity. What was new there?

There was a knock at his door. Since his ghost sense didn't go off, Danny shrugged and assumed it was safe. "Come in," he called, not moving from his spot on the bed.

The door opened, and Liz entered the room, looking thoughtful. When she saw Danny lying down, she walked over to the side of the bed. "Mind if I sit here?"

"No, not really," Danny replied indifferently.

She sat down. "What's the matter? You seem like you're thinking about something."

Danny shrugged. "I'm trying to remember what I was doing before I arrived in Death City, so I can figure out why I'm even here. I wasn't going to question it at first, but I'm starting to find it weird, to say the least, that I just sort of… came here for no reason. I don't even know where 'here' is in relation to home…"

To Danny's surprise, Liz put her arm around him gently. "Well, I don't think I can help in any way, but if it makes you feel better, you've definitely been helping us. I'm not sure what we would have done today if it wasn't for you."

"To be totally honest," Danny confessed, "I have this feeling that whatever happened today was my fault in the first place."

Liz shrugged. "It's not your fault unless you personally set the ghosts on the city, and I doubt you did. We all doubt it. And nobody blames you for what happened."

"You're wrong," Danny interrupted, feeling suddenly upset. "Soul said that it was weird that I came and ghosts came at the same time. Stein definitely was taking that into consideration too – did you see his expression? And when I asked Kid if he went on missions like that often, he replied saying something along the lines of, 'Sometimes, but they usually aren't caused by people we know,' and then he gave me a nasty glance. I'm pretty sure everyone blames me, Liz."

There was a stifling but brief silence. "Well, _I_ don't blame you," Liz said finally, "and neither does Patty. I think if you asked Tsubaki, she'd say the same thing."

Biting back a sharp retort, Danny decided to merely say, "Thank you, I suppose."

Liz got up from where she was sitting. "I came in to see if you were doing okay, not to share in your pity. It might not be your fault that there are ghosts in Death City, but it's still your responsibility – none of us really know how to deal with them like you do. So I hope you get over your self-deprecation sooner than later. That's all." She made for the door, and as she was leaving, added, "Geez, you're almost as bad as Kid. He must be rubbing off on you or something."

The door shut, and Danny couldn't help from grinning, despite himself. Without meaning to, Liz had boosted his spirits.

Regardless, Danny still felt extremely tired. It had been a long day, to say the least, and although it was only late afternoon, he still felt ready for a nap. In fact, that idea was sounding better by the moment. With a sigh, he pulled the covers over himself and buried his face in the pillow.

Although he was a teenager and taking a nap in the middle of the day was against his nature, he was asleep faster than he had thought possible.


	7. Vague Nightmare

"_I don't need help," Danny moaned. "Come on, Jazz, I told you, stop treating me like a little kid. I'm in high school now. I have to do these things on my own."_

_ "No you don't," Jazz pleaded. "You're never too old to get help if you need –"_

_ Danny slammed the door in her face._

_ When he sat down to start, he realized he might have liked to have Jazz's help after all. He struggled in every subject in school, but math was definitely one of the worst. But he couldn't decide which was more humiliating: struggling, or the embarrassing act of admitting to his sister that he had been utterly wrong. _

_Maybe later he'd call Tucker or Sam instead, and they could help. Both of them were far better of when it came to school than Danny himself._

_ While he was feeling rather foolish contemplating this, his ghost sense went off. Knowing his parents were out of the house and he was home alone with Jazz, Danny morphed into his ghost form immediately. With ghostly enemies attacking him at every turn, one could never be too prepared._

_ The ghost in question phased through the door, and it turned out to be, not an enemy, but a small green puppy. It was Cujo, the ghostly guard dog that had once rampaged through Amity Park in search of his lost stuffed animal, and had, in the process, destroyed his classmate Valerie's life. This chain of events had thus transformed Valerie from a popular, wealthy girl into a ruined social outcast desperately trying to make money when she had none to spare. Filled with a deep grudge for the ghosts who had ruined her life – Cujo, and Danny, who Valerie assumed was his owner – Valerie had become a ghost hunter destined to bring constant misery to Danny's ghostly life._

_ Despite the lasting wave of destruction Cujo appeared to leave behind wherever he went, Danny had taking a grudging liking to the dog, who also assumed Danny was his owner. Cujo was overly energetic and acted bit dim at times, but being a guard dog, was a faithful companion. Besides, Danny acted a bit dim at times too, so he could sympathize. _

"_Hey, boy!" Danny laughed, as the small ghost puppy launched himself into Danny's arms. "You scared me for a moment. I thought you were gonna be someone who'd come to kill me. What are you doing here?"_

_ Cujo merely whined shrilly and pawed at the boy's chest. Glancing down at the terrified expression on the ghost dog's face, Danny's relief quickly turned to unease. "What's the matter, boy? Is something –"_

_ His ghost sense went off a second time. "You were trying to warn me about something, weren't you, Cujo?" Danny asked, his mood darkening once again. Setting the ghost puppy on his bed, Danny turned towards the door, now on high alert. _

_ The figure that phased through the door was also familiar to Danny, and brought another wave of relief. It was Wulf, a canine-like ghost whose claws could rip through the air and create portals to another dimension. Danny breathed a sigh of relief; Wulf was also a friend._

_ "Wulf? Long time no see," Danny greeted him. "How have you been – ?" He cut himself off in alarm as the ghost turned to face him; his eyes, usually green, glowed a deep and menacing shade of red. The expression in Wulf's eyes was equally menacing, and his teeth were pulled into a snarl._

_ Walker's controlling him again, Danny thought. No, it can't be Walker, he didn't have these powers. He had controlled Wulf with an electric collar, but this was different. This time, Wulf seemed… possessed._

_ Before Danny could recompose himself, Wulf lunged at Danny, claws outstretched. The ghost boy cried out as he was flung to the floor. With utter panic, Cujo leapt off Danny's lap and cowered under the bed. _

_ "Aren't you supposed to be a guard dog?" Danny muttered, but he didn't blame Cujo for fleeing – the gleam in his former friend's eyes was unsettling. _

_Sensing the shadow of Wulf looming over him, Danny attempted to roll out of the way, but nonetheless felt the sting of Wulf's claws as they closed around him. The ghost was faster than Danny himself, and what was worse, Danny couldn't break free from his grasp._

_ Wulf lifted Danny to eye level and hissed at him, then, with his other claw, cut a streak through the air leading to another world. To Danny, it didn't even look like he had opened a portal to the Ghost Zone, but rather to a new and entirely foreign dimension. Wulf's gotten stronger, he realized. Or maybe it's this thing that's possessing him that's making him stronger._

_ "My master told me to get rid of you," Wulf snarled in a voice that was slightly mechanical, and much more fluent in English than the old Wulf could have ever managed. "Have fun on your trip to another dimension, impure human scum!" The ghost swung back his fist to collide with Danny's face, and Danny yelped, feeling a sensation that was vaguely reminiscent of electrocution. _

_ The last sight Danny saw before being tossed into the other dimension was Cujo, attempting to escape Wulf's notice by scurrying further under the bed. Wulf spotted him anyway, and laughed maliciously. "Now, to take care of your pathetic dog."_

_ Danny blacked out._


	8. Frenemies

"Danny!" Death the Kid shouted, shaking Danny by the shoulders. "Wake up and come eat dinner already. I will not be able to stand it if we sit at the table at 7:59 or 8:01. No, we must set ourselves down to dine at exactly 8:00 pm, so that everything is precise and perfect. …Danny?"

The boy was roused groggily from sleep. "I was dreaming. It was importa–"

"There's no time to dream when we must be down in the dining room in exactly…" Kid checked his watch, "two minutes! Come on, get out of bed! _Now!_"

Danny couldn't believe his ears. Here he was, trying to figure out the entire reason why he was in Death City, and now he had enough information to possibly do something about it. But all Kid cared about was his precious, worthless symmetry! Danny was seriously beginning to doubt that Kid would even blink an eye if Danny was brutally murdered the next day, as long as the puddles of blood oozing from his fatal wounds spread out evenly on both sides of his body.

It was beginning to grate on his nerves.

"Make me," Danny grumbled.

Kid looked like he was going to faint on the spot. "What?" he shrieked, checking his watch frantically.

"You heard me," Danny taunted. "I said, 'make me.'"

With a gasp, Kid turned towards the door. "Liz, Patty!" he shouted down the hallway. "Help me put this miscreant in his place!"

"No," the voice of Liz floated back from the dining room, her voice faint due to the distance between them. "Sorry, but this is getting ridiculous even for us! And that's saying something, since we have to put up with you all day all the time."

"Fine," Kid seethed, turning back on Danny with a manic fire burning in his yellow eyes. "I'll take care of this myself!"

Kid launched himself at Danny before the ghost boy could realize what was happening, and in an instant he found himself painfully pinned to the ground by one of Kid's heavy black boots. The shinigami was glaring down at Danny with a look of pure contempt. "You disgust me," Kid snarled. "I thought you of all people could be converted into a better way of thinking."

"There's someone after me!" Danny screamed, his bottled rage escaping suddenly. "I just remembered happened – I was just dreaming about what happened before I arrived here! One of my friends was possessed by some evil power, his eyes were really freaky and red, and it scared me, and then he threw me into some dimension – this dimension – to get rid of me. But there's someone else behind all this, some kind of mastermind, I know it! And I need to figure out what's going on, and I was going to tell you so you could, I dunno, maybe help me? But no, God forbid we don't get to dinner right on schedule! Why can't you put your stupid desires behind you for once and listen to someone else for a change?"

In the silence that followed, the hall clock chimed loudly eight times. It was exactly 8:00 pm.

Neither of the boys spoke, glowering at one another with malice.

Kid turned away from Danny and began to chuckle. "Red eyes? Your friend had red eyes when he was possessed?"

"Well, yeah – yes," Danny stammered, caught off-guard by Kid's apparent fixation on a completely random and pointless detail. Was that really all that stuck with him? "Didn't you hear the rest of what I was saying?" Danny pleaded, desperate to believe that Kid wasn't entirely hopeless.

Kid swiveled his head back around to gaze at Danny. "Red eyes… like this?"

The shinigami's eyes were blood crimson.

The frustrated expression which had before seemed harmless was now laced with a very real and nasty hatred.

"I didn't bring you here to strand you," Kid said in a now mechanical voice, grinding his boot harder into Danny's chest. "I brought you here because you are out of your element and it will be easier to destroy you with the help of these ridiculous meisters and their soul wavelength weapons. Destroying you in Amity Park would not have been so easy – after all, even a possessed ghost can be sucked into your stupid Fenton Thermos, but human beings, no matter how many paranormal weapons they possess, cannot. Also," he added as an afterthought, "now that you have become friends with the useless pawns of that Shibusen school, it will be harder for you and your conscience to destroy them if they attack you. You are powerless, and in a perfectly exposed situation to be annihilated."

"Who are you…?" Danny whispered hoarsely, finding it difficult to breathe in the position he was currently in. "Why are you trying to kill me, and why did you send that ghost invasion after me here in Death City?"

The shinigami looked bored. "So many questions," he drawled in a robotic voice. "I'm not in the mood for questions. But I will indulge, just to humor you.

"I suppose you could call me an anti-fan, of you and your ridiculous half-ghost hero charade. You bring disgrace to the name of ghosts with your alter-ego impurity, and insult what we stand for by helping humans – and by being one. I am trying to kill you so that humans can go back to being humans and ghosts can go back to being ghosts without your ridiculous, heroic, egotistical interference. Oh, and the ghost invasion was just a welcome present to Death City from me."

Danny grimaced. "You didn't answer the most important question. Who are you?"

Kid grinned. "Sorry, but that'll be for you to figure out on your own. By the way, in less than twenty-four hours, I will have stored enough power to be strong enough to possess armies of pawns if I so desire. So…watch your back, Danny Phantom. You can try to get help from your newfound friends, but you will never know when those friends will turn on you. Have fun living the last day of your existence in a total paranoid state, halfa scum!" He swept his foot across Danny's face with a deft kick, and the ghost boy cried out, more with surprise than pain.

The next instant, Kid's eyes faded back to yellow, and then closed as the shinigami collapsed on the floor next to Danny, unconscious. To Danny, the entire surreal incident seemed to have passed by so quickly that he was unsure whether it had even happened.

"Kid…?" Danny whispered, then hesitated. He had heard what the possessed shinigami had said – even his friends could become his enemies in a heartbeat, and Danny didn't want to have to hurt them. He would have to face this shadowy enemy alone.

"I'm sorry, Kid," Danny said with some regrets, getting up from the floor and jumping into the air, "but I don't want that… that thing… to ever infect you, or anyone in Death City, ever again."

Without saying more, he phased through the roof of the mansion and into the evening sky without looking back, determined to find the source of his misery on his own.


	9. A Search For Missing Persons

"Kid? Kid? Argh, what's up with him?" Liz paced back and forth in the dining room, clearly aggravated. "This isn't like him… it's 8:01 and he's still not in the dining room… Patty! Are you even listening to me?" she snapped. Her ridiculous sister was giggling about something again, but Liz wasn't in the mood to ask what about. "I'm going to go check on him, kay?" Patty didn't answer, which was just as well – Liz was already gone.

But the more serious of the two Thompson sisters received a nasty shock when she went into the living room. Her meister was unconscious on the floor and splayed in a very unnatural position. "Kid?" Liz screeched, bending down to shake him. "Kid! What happened?"

Kid emitted a faint moan and twitched. "Urgh… Liz?"

"What in the world happened?" Liz repeated frantically.

The shinigami blinked up at her. "To be honest, Liz, I'm not sure." He appeared uncharacteristically frazzled. "I think I was trying to get Danny to come to dinner on time."

"Where is Danny anyway?"

Kid shrugged uneasily. "I'm not sure about that either. I don't remember what happened."

"He's not in his room, sis…" Patty's voice sounded from behind Liz, startling her. She hadn't even thought her sister had been listening.

"Well, that's strange," Liz muttered, acting gruff to hide her worry.

Patty was solemn. "Something doesn't feel right," she said softly, her tone an odd yet strangely welcome departure from her usual childish attitude. "I think we should go look for him. Maybe ask around and see if anybody saw him?"

The three nodded into agreement and left the mansion, Kid once again summoning his flying skateboard. Without being commanded to, the two girls morphed into guns, and then they were off.

"We're going by Maka and Soul's house first, because it's closest, and ask them if they've seen Danny," Kid shouted, attempting to be heard over the wind. Neither Liz nor Patty responded, but Kid had too many other things on his mind at the moment to be bothered. He rode in silence for the rest of the short trip, occasionally glancing up at the bizarre grinning moon rising in the sky as if comforted by the sight of its twisted face.

Kid arrived at the house of Maka soon after, returning his skateboard to his palm before knocking hard and impatiently on the door. After a few unbearable moments of silence where Kid thought Maka might not be home, and also agonized over the fact that she needed to replace her doorknob because it was dented asymmetrically on one side, Maka answered the door. Her hand appeared to be shaking; Kid was distressed by how desolate her expression was, and forgot for a moment why he was there.

"Are you okay?" Kid asked, alarmed.

Maka shook her head slowly. "Soul… he turned on me," she finally managed to choke out. "I don't know what happened – one moment we were eating dinner, and then he got this really peculiar, scary expression, and he tried to attack me… and then he ran off… I couldn't even get him to listen to me…"

Kid thought about this for a moment. "Not that this is any comfort, but I don't think that was Soul's mind… I think the same thing might have happened to me."

"What?" Liz's voice interrupted from inside the gun. "You said you didn't remember anything."

"I don't, really," Kid confessed thoughtfully. "But maybe I was possessed. After all, I have a strange gap in my memory, and this could mean that I was taken over by something for a few brief moments."

"Or it could be a stretch in logic," Liz muttered, although inwardly she admitted it did make sense.

In an instant, the depression fled from Maka's face. "Soul's been possessed? What are we waiting for, then? We have to go rescue him!"

"Nyaaaa~!" Blair wailed, popping up from behind Maka's shoulder. "Rescue Soul? Let me come too, _meow_!"

Both Kid and Maka stared at her for a moment with an expression similar to the expression with which everyone viewed Excalibur. Then, finally, both Kid and Maka grumbled and relented.

"But that's not even why we came here," Liz reminded them as she and Patty turned back into humans for conversational purposes. "Danny's gone missing too. We were, well, wondering if you'd seen him."

"No," Maka said flatly. "Sorry about that. Maybe we'll run into him when looking for Soul. Anyway, let's go by Black*Star and Tsubaki's house and get them to help, too. The more people keeping a lookout, the better."

Liz was about to protest, but Kid held up a hand to stop her. "All right, fine. That sounds like a decent plan for now. Let's not waste another moment, then."

The five took off in a run down the street, and everyone, including Blair – who lacked her usual playful demeanor – seemed more somber than usual.

To their despair, however, when they arrived, it appeared that a similar catastrophe had happened. Tsubaki was in tears, and alone.

"Black*Star ran off," she wailed. "His eyes turned red and he was grinning like a maniac, and then he pushed me aside with more force than I had thought him capable of with such a little push… and then he was gone…it was like he had no emotions…"

"It's not just Black*Star," Maka stated anxiously. "It happened to Soul too. We're looking for him right now… Maybe they're together."

"I'll come with," Tsubaki replied forcefully. "It was so scary…I've never seen Black*Star look like that…" She trailed off. Maka laid her hand on Tsubaki's shoulder briefly, a gesture that was meant to be comforting, and Tsubaki smiled weakly up at her.

Then Maka turned to face the rest of the group. "Let's go. Our friends are in danger and we don't have a moment to lose!" She dashed away again intently, leaving the rest to follow her.

Since when did she become the leader of this operation? Kid thought to himself, more amused than bothered. Shrugging at both Liz and Patty, who both looked like they were still fretting about the mysterious disappearance of their newfound half-ghost friend, he followed Maka, hoping that they did indeed discover the location of Danny on their search for Black*Star and Soul. I would hate to lose him, Kid thought. He was such a good candidate to convince about the merit of perfect symmetry.


	10. Rooftops Make Good Battlefields

Danny was having problems of his own.

He was lost, that was the sad truth of it. Just a moment ago he had been all set to find the mystery ghost and quash its threat on his own. But now, he realized that this task was easier said than done, especially in a foreign city. Danny felt frustrated, helpless, and above all, paranoid; he jumped at every movement of the wind, fearing his faceless foe was behind him at every turn.

Oddly enough, the only aspect of the situation that was preventing Danny from screaming with annoyance was the weather. He had almost forgotten how calming it was to fly on a beautiful night, and if Danny wasn't chasing a ghostly enemy at the moment, he would have definitely closed his eyes and enjoyed the breeze. It was late evening, the sky nearly dark but for a faint streak of sunset rapidly disappearing at the horizon. Nothing seemed to be amiss.

Then Danny spotted a red-eyed figure crouched on the roof of one of the taller buildings. Even from this distance, Danny could tell he was being watched, and gave a start. Dreading an attack, he alighted down on the roof to face his enemy.

But it was merely Soul, gazing at him with a typical bored expression plastered to his face. That's right, Danny thought, a little embarrassed about his own suspicions. Soul always has red eyes. And he looks like he's himself anyway. There's nothing to be afraid of.

"I can explain," Danny said guiltily.

"Explain what?" Soul drawled. "People fly around at night all the time. It's not that weird."

There wasn't really anything to explain after all, Danny realized, because Soul didn't know what was going on. "Oh, never mind," Danny shrugged. "What are you doing up here?"

Soul copied Danny's shrug. "Maka can be bossy, and a real stick-in-the-mud sometimes. I just came here to get away from her for a few minutes, is all."

Danny nodded and sat down next to him, swinging his legs over the side of the building. "I can see that, I suppose," he began, "but since you guys are partners, well… it'll probably end up all right eventually. Everyone has arguments," he added awkwardly, thinking of himself and Sam.

Soul didn't respond. His mind appeared to be preoccupied with something else. Finally, he muttered, "…whatever," and turned away from Danny slightly. The ghost boy was at a loss. Apparently his attempt at comforting Soul hadn't worked.

Danny stood up. "Um, okay, then." An uncomfortable pause. "Well. Anyway, I need to –"

He saw the movement out of the corner of his eye a second before he was nailed by the punch.

Bright lights assailed Danny's vision, making him stagger backward dizzily, tripping over his own feet and falling onto his back. His head throbbed painfully where he had been struck, and his vision was reeling. With a moan, he forced himself to his feet and faced his attacker. Upon discovering who had punched him, Danny's good spirit vanished in an instant, as he realized that Soul's emotional angst was the least of his worries.

It was Black*Star, eyes blazing.

Danny cursed, jumped into the air, and lunged himself at the possessed ninja assassin at full speed. To Danny's surprise, however, Black*Star was faster, grabbing Danny by the arms before he even had a chance to think about shooting plasma beams at his attacker. Black*Star flung him unceremoniously to the side, watching with twisted satisfaction as the ghost halfa skidded painfully on concrete, the friction scraping even his gloves away to reveal the bloodied hands underneath.

"I said less than twenty-four hours," jeered a voice that was – yet wasn't – Black*Star's. "I didn't say twenty-three-and-a-half hours. I could have meant I was going to get more powerful in five minutes, for all you know."

Ignoring the snarky comment, the ghost boy rose shakily from the ground. "Soul," he shouted desperately. "Help me defeat Black*Star! He's obviously possessed by some –" He flinched as a pair of sturdy hands grabbed him by the shoulders.

"You sappy moron," Soul spat from behind Danny, all eloquence lost. He then proceeded to shove Danny face-first into the roof of the building and stomp on his back with full force.

Something snapped loudly. Danny's muffled yell could be heard despite his face being pressed into the ground, and Soul snickered. "How cute. You scream like a girl."

But Danny wasn't down for the count yet. Mustering all his energy, he kicked out with his back legs, propelling Soul backwards away from him. As the scythe staggered and tried to regain his composure, Danny leapt to his feet and aimed another kick at Soul's face, this time striking him more precisely with the sharp edge of his boot. A thin streak of blood was cut across Soul's cheek where he had been sliced.

Before Danny could finish his strike, however, Black*Star used his foot to deftly knock down the remaining leg Danny had been balancing on. The ghost boy fell once again, bracing himself with his hands, and shivered in pain as his raw palms throbbed.

Out of the corner of his eye, Danny saw Black*Star's arm shoot forward as if he was throwing something, and Danny had just enough time to roll frantically out of the way before a dangerous-looking knife buried itself in the ground, cracking the concrete where Danny's chest had been a moment before. The ghost boy shuddered at the thought of what had almost happened.

However, Danny was now on his back on the ground, which was an extremely vulnerable position to be in during a fight, so he flipped over hastily and pressed both hands against the ground. At once, the concrete began to crystallize, turning clear and cold, until the entire roof of the building had been transformed to a solid sheet of ice. Danny figured this gave him a slight advantage since he could float over the ice, but as far as he knew, neither Black*Star or Soul could fly. He hoped.

He removed his hands from the ice, leaving two green stains where his palms had bled onto the concrete, and stood up, taking flight as he did. Both Black*Star and Soul were standing at opposite ends of the icy arena, unmoving.

"Come and get me," Danny taunted, feeling inwardly unnerved at their stillness.

As if responding to his cue, they both charged him at once, remarkably sure-footed despite running on ice. How is that even possible? Danny thought with some misery, raising both his palms at the two boys and shooting plasma beams at them both. Each hesitated for only a moment as they were struck, slipping slightly, then Black*Star raised his own palm and shot a giant bolt of something at Danny that looked a little like lightening.

The boy felt his heart would stop at the force of the electrocution. He couldn't even scream; his body refused to move and it felt like every one of his nerves was shaking. With no control over his limbs, he collapsed weakly, and saw Black*Star and Soul peering down at him with emotionless faces.

"Black*Star can shoot soul wavelength without Tsubaki there to amplify it," Soul said robotically, smiling sourly. Danny remembered Kid telling him about soul wavelength, and how weapons merely made the meisters' soul wavelength stronger; in other words, the weapons were basically powered by their meisters' strength.

"But I amplify it more than that weak girl Tsubaki ever could," Black*Star added in an equally mechanical voice, and Danny knew that his words came not from Black*Star but from his enemy, whoever that enemy was.

Danny attempted to reply to them, but his body would not stop trembling. Finally, he managed to stammer out, "…S-stop playing g-games. Who are y-you?"

They both laughed, eerily in sync with one another. "Why, we're Black*Star and Soul, your friends," they mocked in unison. "Don't you remember us?"

Seething with rage, Danny summoned enough energy to leap at whoever was closer, which happened to be Soul, and pin him down with as much force as he could muster. "_Who are you?_" Danny demanded. He was still quivering from Black*Star's soul wavelength blast, and Soul could have easily pushed him off.

"I'm Soul," the scythe cried. "What are you doing, you fool? Get off me!"

Hearing this incongruous statement, Danny immediately realized something was amiss. He looked up to see Maka had somehow managed to arrive on the roof, followed by Kid, Blair, the Thompson sisters, and Tsubaki.

Maka screamed with rage when she saw what was happening, and lunged herself at Danny. The last Danny saw of Soul before he was forced to the ground once again was a self-satisfied smirk stained with blood dripping from the cut in his cheek. He's still possessed, Danny thought with some dread. He's just acting. But how will I be able to prove it?

"How dare you attack Soul?" Maka hissed menacingly. "Soul was right – you were bad news when you came here. First bringing those ghosts to attack us and pretending to be the hero, then overshadowing all of us as if there was some sort of other enemy around, but it was really you all along, wasn't it?"

Danny blinked. "Overshadowing…?"

"I know you can possess people!" Maka snarled. "Kid told me all about your powers on the way here. Don't try to deny it."

"…Well, yes, I can," Danny admitted, "but –"

Maka interrupted him. "No more of this. Soul, transform." The haunted boy complied, turning into his customary scythe form before Danny's eyes. His meister grabbed the scythe's handle and pointed the huge curved blade menacingly at Danny's neck. "I'm going to exterminate you right here and now, because this ghost madness needs to stop. Now!"

"Can't you see souls?" Danny asked desperately, remembering something Kid had told him. "Can't you see that I mean no harm?"

"No," Maka said. "In fact, I can't see your soul at all. I've been suspicious of you from the start, but realizing that I couldn't sense your soul was the last straw for me. I don't trust someone without a soul!"

"Maka…" Danny pleaded. "Listen to me! I'm being hunted…" He couldn't believe the others were just standing there and watching. Maybe, he thought with some dismay, they _all_ suspected him – at least to some extent.

"Save it, ghost," she replied. "I saw you attacking Soul, and no amount of whining is going to make me forget that." She raised the scythe above her head and brought it down on Danny's head with as much force as she could.

Black*Star sneered.


	11. Anticlimactic Warehouse Scuffle

Tsubaki noticed.

"Maka, _stop!_" she yelped.

The unexpected outburst by her friend seemed to give Maka second thoughts, and she hesitated, bringing the blade to an abrupt halt inches before it would have decapitated Danny. The ghost boy breathed a nervous sigh of relief.

"What…?" she demanded. "Don't tell me you believe him?"

Rather than answer, Tsubaki motioned towards Black*Star, whose twisted grin was still plastered to his face. He straightened up robotically as if on cue to Tsubaki's gesture, and, without warning, leapt at Maka. She swung the scythe forward to protect herself, but found to her dismay that Soul had suddenly become unwieldy and heavy. Before she had time to register what was going on, the scythe was swinging back at her with twice the force, giving her only several seconds to pull herself together and dodge. Even so, Soul struck her directly in the shoulder. There was a spray of blood, and Maka staggered backwards, eyes dull with a haunted expression.

"Maka!" Tsubaki screamed frantically; Liz, the closest to Maka, rushed forward and caught her as she fell.

With fresh determination, Danny scrambled up from the ground and lunged at Soul. But the scythe morphed back into his human form and leapt limberly backwards away from Danny, landing next to Black*Star.

Appearing to spontaneously jerk backwards, the two boys stood up straighter in a moment of unnatural synchronization and looked off into the night as if they were dogs perking up to the sound of a whistle. Before Danny or anyone else could react, Soul and Black*Star jumped from the roof of the building and disappeared into darkness, eyes flashing red as they went.

Giving up on the chase for the time being, Danny turned to Maka. Liz supported her while Patty dabbed the blood from her wound.

"How bad is it?" Tsubaki finally broke the stunned silence by asking.

Maka shrugged awkwardly. "It's really nothing," she muttered. "It's just a shallow thing. It doesn't hurt that badly. I just… I was so surprised that Soul… turned against me like that."

Tsubaki shook her head. "Soul _didn't_ turn against you," she reminded Maka. "He's possessed by… something. So is Black*Star…"

"I guess you're right," Maka agreed with a sigh. She then turned to Danny apologetically. "I'm… sorry I nearly… you know. I just felt…"

Danny interrupted her. "It's fine. It's… really fine." Except for the fact that you nearly killed me and I was scared out of my mind, Danny thought grudgingly to himself, but decided to let it pass for now. There were other, more pressing things to worry about. "I have to go after Black*Star and Soul as soon as possible. There's something possessing them. I mean, I know that's obvious, but it appears to be a really powerful ghost that has a grudge against me. Therefore, I feel like it's my duty to deal with this."

Maka stood up, all sheepishness gone. "No, I'm going too. This ghost is hurting my friends and it's my business too." When her friends regarded her with concern, she brushed them off. "I'm really not hurt. I'll lead the way." Before anyone could argue, Maka was off, Tsubaki and Blair following close behind her.

Both Liz and Patty transformed into guns, and Kid, who had been oddly reticent throughout the entire incident, now turned to Danny. "I was possessed earlier, wasn't I?" His face looked grim.

Danny nodded a little awkwardly. "Yeah… it's nothing –"

"No," Kid interrupted, voice displaying no emotion. His eyes glowed with a fierce energy, and Danny took a nervous step backwards. "It is not nothing. I refuse to be used." He leapt off the roof of the building, created his flying skateboard once again, and landed lightly on top of it. "Come on. You're dawdling." With that, Kid took off, and Danny, feeling rather muddled, took off after him.

The wind whipped Danny's hair against his face as he flew, following his instincts to lead him to the ghost. A feeling of nausea and a growing sense of dread was plaguing him, and he gave an involuntary shudder. The shadows on the buildings looked like dark cloaks threatening to engulf him, and the grinning moon above him, lighting up the alleyways with its shifting yellow light, made Death City seem all the more disconcerting.

Noticing that the others had stopped, Danny lighted down next to them. They were standing in front of a gray abandoned warehouse whose wooden door was creaking in the wind, slightly ajar. The glass in every window was shattered, and a web of cracks laced along the concrete walls of the building. But what unnerved Danny the most was that he could sense a powerful and repellent pulsating aura exuding from the building. He knew, without a doubt, that this was the place where the mysterious unknown ghost had created his base. A wisp of blue smoke escaped on his breath, confirming this.

"I had a feeling you'd be here," said a voice, making Danny jump. The group turned around to see Stein leaning against the building, the shadows accentuating the stitches on his face. "I sensed the energy of this place from a long while away."

"We have to save Soul and Black*Star," Maka interrupted. "Come on! There's no time for talking."

"…Very well," Stein replied finally, giving Danny what appeared to be a brief apologetic glance. "Lead the way, then."

Maka nodded determinedly and ran into the building, where she was immediately swallowed by darkness. Stein, Tsubaki, Blair, and finally Kid followed, nodding at Danny as he entered the building. Finally, the ghost boy sucked up as much stamina as he could to banish his sickness caused by the aura, and followed his friends.

Danny created a swirling ball of bright ectoplasm in his palm to light his way, but as the building was illuminated, he perceived that something was wrong. He could see nothing in the empty room besides a decrepit spiral staircase leading to the second floor; his friends were nowhere. The warehouse was stiflingly silent. He felt suddenly cold, and realized a split second before the attack that it was a trap.

Something rammed Danny in the back of his neck, and he coughed, blindly shooting a plasma beam behind him as he staggered forward. There was a shrill yell that made him aware he had hit his target, and he ducked quickly, narrowly avoiding a second blow. Spinning around to see his attacker, Danny saw it was Maka, eyes glowing unnaturally red and expression murderous.

In that moment, Danny grasped that it was impossible for him to fire back and risk hurting Maka, no matter how possessed she was. He took off at a sprint, but was nevertheless clipped in the shoulder by a flying kick from Tsubaki, equally as mad. The force of the kick threw him to the ground, and he scrambled to his feet, panting heavily, before being nailed twice in the back by two bullets from Patty and Liz. He turned around to see Kid, eyes blazing with the same evil that had seized his soul that night at his mansion. Danny backed up, desperate not to hurt anyone, but finding himself at a major disadvantage.

He felt the prick of a sharp blade on his back, and he whipped around to see Stein towering over him, a knife in each hand. "I'm going to dissect you now, just like I wanted to before, ghost boy." Danny yelped and fled, and the jab of Stein's knives sliced empty air.

"Pump-pumpkin, pumpkin, _death and destruction,"_ crooned a voice that seemed both terrifyingly sweet and mechanically deadly.

_Not Blair too!_

A deafening roar filled the warehouse as the walls exploded. Danny was blown backward off his feet and slammed into the wall, seeing a flash of light as his vision blurred. He could hear parts of the walls and ceiling crumbling down around him, and yelped as a chunk of concrete smashed into his wrist, putting out his ectoplasmic lantern in his surprise. After the noise stopped and silence resumed its eerie creaking, thick cloud of smoke and dust had covered even the darkness.

Danny desperately got to his feet once again and dashed for the hazy outline of the spiral staircase he had spotted earlier. He could sense that the ghostly power he was looking for resided on the second floor, and he needed to get there before the dust settled and his possessed friends came back to finish him off.

Panting, he limped up the stairs as quickly as he could. Each step creaked, and he expected the sound to alert someone to his presence and come after him. But no one attacked him as he stepped onto the second floor, this one made of wood rather than concrete. The room was empty except for one large glass window at the far end that overlooked Death City. Unlike on the first floor, there were no sounds of creaking. It was utterly silent.

A dark figure, clad in a black cloak, stood with his back to Danny, facing the window and watching the stars. Danny knew immediately from the overwhelming energy radiating forward that this was the ghost he had been searching for.

"I knew you would find me eventually," the silhouette stated calmly, without turning around. Danny flinched. "I've been waiting for you. Now we can settle this."


	12. Melodramatic Monologue

"Who are you?" Danny demanded. "What do you want with me and why are you harming my friends?"

"I want to destroy you," the figure remarked indifferently. Danny noted that the voice seemed rather young, seeming to come from a person only several years older than himself. "Because you are a disgrace to the Ghost Zone."

The ghost turned around, and Danny was able to get a good look at him for the first time. He was lanky, much taller than Danny, and slightly older-looking, appearing to be anywhere from nineteen to twenty-three years old. Of course, Danny reflected, who really knew how long he had been dead?

He seemed to have once been a redhead, with long scruffy hair and freckles that were now merely pale gray and transparent along with the rest of his ghostly complexion. His pointy nose gave him a rather austere and sneering expression, and his deep red eyes were the same color of those of his possessed victims.

Even more peculiar was his outfit. Not only was he clad in a black cloak, he also sported a black fancy top hat with a dark red rose pinned to the outside, and white gloves. In his fingers he lazily twirled a wand, black with white tips at either end, which added to the appearance of a stereotypical magician.

"Ah, yes, a formal introduction is probably what you seek," mused the ghost, snapping Danny back to reality. "All right, then, Danny Phantom.

"At the time of my death, I regarded humans with utmost scorn. I felt them to be low forms of being; disgusting, impulsive creatures. In some ways it was almost a relief to die. I had found out about ghosts and the afterlife, and was intrigued. But there was no way to conduct my research on Earth, especially being so young and unknown in the scientific world. So I poured myself a glass of poison and departed the world."

_He committed suicide?_ Danny thought. _What a pretentious way to say it. _ He had always suspected that some of the ghosts he encountered had more morbid pasts than he knew of – the lyrics to Ember's song seemed to hint at suicide as well, especially coupled with the youthful appearance of her ghost – but the thought still made him shudder.

"I realized shortly after my death that being a ghost was my true calling. I had powers unimaginable and was part of a race of creatures that held humans in almost as much contempt as I did. Slowly, I begun to train, and developed my ghostly abilities, until I discovered a new ghost power beyond the basics. I learned that I could possess humans from an unusually far distance. I started off possessing two or three at once, and soon found that I could control entire armies from miles away.

"This by itself wasn't anything too revolutionary, of course. But I soon discovered that for me, this power had a few unique qualities. For one, the more humans I possessed, the stronger I became, rather than weakening by splitting myself into many ectoplasmic clones and dividing my energy."

Danny knew what he was talking about: when Vlad had split himself into hundreds of clones in order to possess the voters of Amity Park during the mayoral election, he had to be in the vicinity of the clones in order to control them, and each clone had been significantly weaker than Vlad usually was. Even Danny found splitting into four clones taxing on his energy, almost as much as using his Ghostly Wail.

"But what was most intriguing was how this affected my victims. People I possessed suddenly became fiercer warriors and stronger foes than ever before. As I started to learn how to possess ghosts as well, I realized that my possessions amplified their ghost powers far beyond their normal strength. As I discovered myself and discovered my powers, I completely disregarded my human name and gave myself a ghostly alias: Parasite."

"How macabre," Danny interjected. He received no response.

"For a while, I was content to just practice my powers and be content with my own strength. But then you came along, a halfa, a human-ghost hybrid, Danny Phantom, and I realized I could not rest any longer. What you were doing with your powers was appalling. You captured ghosts in order to aid the repulsive humans, and caused them no end of pain and misery. Ghosts were thrown in Walker's jail and made to suffer long, grueling sentences due to your disregard for their respect. And all the while you relished in your status as a hero on the human plane.

"Now, Danny Phantom, it is time for me to rid this world of you once and for all. You are a disgrace to the purity of ghosts, and I will never let this stand!"

Danny bridled. "But I haven't done anything wrong!" he protested. "I like being a human and I didn't _ask_ for ghost powers! But I can't just stand by and watch ghosts invade my city and torment my friends and family. Maybe if you guys just stayed out of our way, there wouldn't be this whole conflict in the first place!"

"And stay in the Ghost Zone?" Parasite snapped back, sounding offended. "I don't think you quite understand, Danny Phantom. You humans would rather live on the human plane, but so would we. It's much more interesting than the endless swirling void of the Ghost Zone. If we visit, we are sent back because we are ghosts. We don't really think that it's fair that you can travel between the two world with ease because of some freak lab accident."

Danny opened his mouth to retort, but hesitated. Ghosts would rather live on the human plane? He had never really looked at it that way before. Maybe by sending them back to the Ghost Zone in the Fenton Thermos, he had been crossing a moral boundary without even realizing it.

Before he could apologize and try to straighten things out, Parasite spoke again, taking Danny's hesitation to be a sign of weakness. "No one's ever challenged your righteous position before, Phantom? No matter. You won't be around long enough to process it."

With that, he rushed at Danny with frightening speed. Danny barely had time to sidestep out of the way, and even so, Parasite's cloak whipped his cheek as he passed. He yelped in pain at the sting and raised his hand to his face – only to find, much to his surprise, that his cheek was wet. He raised his hand in front of his face to find that it was dripping green; the impact from the cloak had created a bloody welt.

"He's not playing around," Danny muttered. "Well, then, neither can I."

He drew a deep breath and unleashed his most powerful attack, his Ghostly Wail. Everything around him seemed to blur as it was drowned out by the reverberating note. The floor began to shake and crack beneath him, the beams of the wall splintering. The staircase he had used to reach the second floor crumbled into a pile of wood scraps, and the floor itself soon followed.

Head spinning from loss of energy, Danny felt himself falling, closing his eyes so he wouldn't have to see the rubble spinning out of control around him – or maybe it was himself that was spinning. His head struck the ground, and a flash of red light seemed to explode under his eyelids. Had his attack been deflected? Was that even possible?

A sharp pain jabbed at Danny's side, and he felt his body spasm and go limp, completely exhausted of energy. He looked up to see Parasite standing over him, a bored expression on his face and his wand was pointed at Danny's neck. "Nice try, boy, but I've absorbed more power than you realize." A slight smirk flickered over his face. "I've had enough fun messing around, though. It's time for you to leave."

The last thing Danny saw was a bolt of blue energy sparking from out of the wand, aimed directly at him. He felt his entire body explode with the sensation of whiplash, and his vision clouded.

"This is too easy." Parasite's voice seemed to come from everywhere at once, fading in and out. "Oh well. See you back in the ghost zone, Danny Phantom… permanently."


	13. Bored to Death, Talked to Victory

_Well, _I'm_ sure having an off day._

How could his thoughts manage sarcasm when his body felt like it was disintegrating into a smoldering fire?

But even as his energy was drained, Danny could feel through the haze in his mind that Parasite had stopped attacking him. Seeing an opening, he raised his hand and struck the ghost with a charged ectoplasmic ray. Parasite skidded backwards and dropped his wand. It rolled towards Danny, who grabbed it and rose to his feet shakily.

"Hey," scoffed an all-too-familiar voice behind him. "I thought you could fight better than this."

Startled, Danny turned around and poised himself to fight, only to sigh in relief. Kid's hands were on his hips – symmetrically – and his gold eyes were trained on Danny condescendingly, as if he had caught Danny slacking off during a job. He knew then that Kid, somehow, was no longer possessed.

Standing next to Kid's right foot was a tiny green puppy, grinning and wagging its tail obliviously.

"Cu…jo?" Danny blinked, utterly confused.

Kid glanced down at the dog and his expression twisted. "_You! I told you to stand in line with my center!" _ He snatched up the puppy with a flourish and set him down again between his legs, leaving the same amount of room on either side. Cujo whimpered comically, then ran to Danny and jumped into his arms. Kid stared after the dog for a moment, then shrugged, grumbling something to himself.

Danny noticed when Kid picked up Cujo that there were what appeared to be bite marks in his left hand, and lines of blood running from them to his wrists. "Are you okay?" Danny managed to ask, forcing himself out of his surprised stupor.

"That your dog?" Kid responded with a spastic shudder, not answering the question.

The ghost boy stared at him. "Yeah… sort of…I mean… he kinda follows me around regardless…" He trailed off. "Now that I think about it, he must've followed me from the tear in dimensions Wulf made when he forced me to come here." Remembering what he had been going to say in the first place, he added, "Hey, thanks for the save. How'd you shake off the possession?"

"That's a very good question," snarled Parasite from behind them, materializing behind Kid. His calm, collected appearance seemed to be shattered, and Danny could almost feel the heat of the rage radiating from him.

Kid faced Parasite without changing his expression. "That dog bit me," he said simply. "Snapped me out of it."

"But…" His chin trembled, and he suddenly seemed like he was about to cry. Danny held his breath, fearing the worst, and even Parasite seemed to be stunned into silence.

"_He only bit me on one hand! Now my perfectly flawless hands are forever marred! They don't match! I tried to get him to bite me on the other hand too, but I was already back to normal and he refused! What if the scar never completely heals? I'll be imperfect for the rest of eternity! How will I ever be able to live with myself?"_ Kid slumped to the floor, practically sobbing.

Danny and Parasite exchanged a glance. For one fleeting moment, the two seemed to be on the same page with their exasperation. Then Parasite, rolling his eyes, took a step back and snapped his fingers, summoning the army of still-possessed weapons and meisters. Their glowing red eyes pierced through the shadows.

"Uh… are you ready to fight yet?" Danny asked, turning to Kid.

With one last squeak and shudder, the depressed shinigami rose to his feet and brushed himself off. "I'll never stand for some ghost using me as a meat puppet."

Danny nodded. "Good. Thanks again for the save," he repeated, hoping for a reply.

But if Kid was going to respond to that, he was cut short by Soul and Black*Star lunging forward to attack him from either side. Unlike Danny, however, who fought purely based on instinct, Kid was well trained. He leapt in the air, swinging his legs at his attackers in a precise and calculated manner. Both boys slammed dramatically into the walls behind them. Liz and Patty took their places, appearing out of the darkness, but Kid was familiar with their fighting style, and was able to take them easily on his own.

At the same time, Maka went after Danny. She was rather fast, and he struggled to dodge her attacks without dealing any damage. Finally, after one particularly precarious evasion, he managed to freeze her feet in place with a blast of cryokinesis. Struggling to move, Maka had to give up, muttering in frustration.

In the next instant, her eyes widened, focused on something behind Danny. He swiveled around to see Blair an inch from his face, looking rather murderous. His heart leapt with fear; then a force behind Blair slammed into her and sent her tumbling out of the way.

"Kid?" Danny called out, then saw the shinigami was busy with his own battle.

"No, ghost boy," came a voice.

Danny heard the footsteps of the person and saw the glint of his glasses before his full body came into view. "Stein? Where have you been?"

"No matter," replied the eccentric scientist, shrugging.

"I thought you'd been –"

Stein cut him off. "Such a cheap trick such as that of the ghost Parasite won't work on an experienced meister like me," he said, smirking.

"B-but…" Danny was indignant. "If you weren't possessed this entire time, why didn't you come and help us sooner?"

There was a moment of silence, then Stein said, "…Well, it was rather fun to watch you fail."

Danny balked. "_That's not an answer!"_

Stein shrugged again. "Go do your job and stop asking questions during the middle of a battle. Kid and I can hold them off while you get that ghostly enemy. That's what you do for a living, right?"

Danny couldn't tell if Stein was mocking him. "Uh… right. Thanks! Come, Cujo," he commanded, then flew to face Parasite once again, this time with the ghost dog following him. The puppy had morphed into his more threatening form during the battle, and now he was at least twice the height of Danny, and bristling with fierceness.

"Back for another beating?" the ghost taunted.

"No, I'm not," Danny stated. "I'm back to win."

"I messed up last time. I let my guard down because I almost felt bad for you after your pathetic little speech. Never again will I let myself be suckered into that." He reached into the pocket of the suit Kid had forced him to wear and pulled out the Fenton Thermos.

Parasite's expression did not change. "The only reason you're still here to fight me is because that stupid black-haired kid saved you," he taunted.

"You're right," Danny said. "I'm lucky to have such loyal friends. I almost feel sorry for you, because you without emotion, and will never have friends." He could feel Parasite's power pulsating forth, but he felt no fear, and continued talking. "Almost, but not quite.

"Did you know that in an alternate timeline, I was a person like you? Devoid of anything good, bent on destruction, aimed to kill. I know exactly how you feel when you act evil: you feel good. I know because I felt good doing what I did, too. But when I stepped back and saw myself doing what I was doing to my friends and family, I was revolted. I realized I could never let myself turn into something like that, ever again.

Now I am faced with someone like you, someone who reminds me of the way I was, someone who is just like the person I vowed never to become. And I feel sorry for you, because you have felt only satisfaction with what evil you do, and I doubt you have the capacity within yourself to ever become good again. You make me realize what I could have lost if I have let myself do what you did.

But whatever happens to you once I send you back to where you came from will be your problem now. I do feel sorry for you, Parasite, but I will never forgive you for using my friends like that!"

Parasite laughed, and began to clap contemptuously. "How touching, ghost boy, but unfortunately, I am beyond susceptible to your little pep-talks."

Danny uncapped and raised the thermos, and pointed it at Parasite. "That's what I was hoping you wouldn't say."

His enemy shrugged. "Do whatever you want, Danny Phantom. As a ghost I know my weakness to your pitiful little thermos. So I will not run. But that doesn't mean I will hate you any less."

"Hate me all you want," Danny replied, his voice rising to a shout. Cujo joined in beside him with a low growl. "But I've still won!"

He pressed the button on the thermos, and a blue light poured from its opening and enveloped Parasite, pulling him in. Even then, the ghost refused to lose his dignity and stood there, unmoving, as he was sucked into the thermos, his arms crossed over his chest and a perpetually bored expression on his face. "See you around sometime, Danny Phantom," he said amiably, his voice echoing as it faded. "Next time, if you find me before it's too late, my personality will be rooted deep in someone you care about even more strongly, and you'll never be able to fight me and win…"

Danny capped the thermos hurriedly, shivering at the proclamation. Even though Parasite was trapped, he had still, in a way, been victorious; Danny knew he now would never be completely free of paranoia about the well-being of his friends and family. It would haunt him until he had to face the vile ghost once again.

_Sam…_

"Danny!" Blair ran up to him, jolting him out of his nightmare. Her eyes were back to normal, and she looked extremely concerned. "Thank goodness!" She laid a hand on his shoulder. "How do you feel, nyaa~?"

The ghost boy considered this for a moment. "Well, tired."

"Tired?" Kid appeared next to Blair, looking unimpressed. "Is that all? After all that?"

He closed his eyes and leaned into Cujo. "…_Really_ tired?"

And he blacked out.


	14. Interlude

"_I can't believe that little wimp passed out! So uncool…"_

"_Don't give him a hard time! He worked hard…"_

"_But he didn't do any of the work!"_

"_Well, _I_ can't believe that we're arguing about that while he's unconscious!"_

"_He sure looks cute while he's sleeping… nyaa~"_

"BLAIR._"_

"_Ever heard of a personal bubble?"_

"_I was just kidding… nyaaaa…"_

"_It's not funny! Ugh…"_

"_Yes, yes, you kids are right, poor Danny needs to be left alone."_

"_Aww… fine, Dr. Stein… you're so mean!"_

"_Just leave him alone, Blair!"_

"_Nyawwww…"_

"_Hey – uh – you didn't have to turn into a cat – I didn't mean to…"_

"_Great going, now you've upset her! Not cool."_

"_It's not my fault she pouts for no reason!"_

"_Hey, Stein, why aren't _you_ leaving?"_

"_Well, _somebody's_ gotta watch him."_

"_Watch... with a scalpel?"_

"_Hey, you better not –"_


	15. Unfortunately Fast Closure

When Danny woke up, the first thing he noticed was that he felt oddly sore all the way down his back, which was strange because he didn't remember getting cut or attacked there. Secondly, he realized he was in a bed back in Kid's mansion, and the room was deserted. Then he became aware of a deep growling sound below him, and peered off the edge of the bed to see Cujo snarling and pacing around a dark purple cat in a witch's hat.

"Blair…?"

Instantly, Blair transformed back into her human form, looking as scantily-clad and flirtatious as ever. "You're awake, ya-ay!" She leapt on the bed and landed directly on top of his chest. A bolt of pain shot down Danny's back and he sat up abruptly, doubling over with coughing.

"Sorry!" She jumped off, looking slightly concerned.

When his breathing became normal again, Danny managed to shoot Blair a pitiful glare, then slid out of bed, noting the suit Kid had lent him to wear – now in tatters – was white. He was still in ghost form. "Where are the others?"

"In the lobby…" She pouted. "But don't you want to stay with Blair a little longer? Alone?"

Danny gave her another look. "No… sorry." He smiled dryly and turned to leave. Blair pursed her lips, turned back into a cat, and followed him.

Following the hum of voices from the other room, Danny walked down the hall.

"…and I discovered that his bones seem to be elastic and he bleeds some kind of ectoplasm, and it contributes to his ghostly energy! I don't think I've ever studied anyone quite so interesting."

"Really, Dr. Stein?" This time it was Liz's voice. "Couldn't you have left the poor guy alone while he recuperated?"

Everyone seemed to freeze when Danny poked his head around the corner. "Danny!" Tsubaki exclaimed unnaturally loudly. "You're all right?"

"You look awful," Kid commented. Everyone turned to look at him in disbelief. "I mean, the suit I gave you to wear is totally ruined!" He jumped up from where he was sitting and grabbed Danny by the shoulders, then began to fix his hair, moving individual strands back into place.

Danny glowered at him, but Kid didn't seem to take the hint. "There we go, at least now you look semi-decent." After one last patting-down of Danny's shoulders, he nodded in satisfaction, but still seemed like he was scrutinizing the ghost's outfit.

"Great, thanks," Danny said dismissively, but his gaze was still fixed on Stein. "Dr. Stein, what were you talking about?"

The scientist grinned creepily but did not respond.

"Hey, Danny…" The ghost boy turned as another voice addressed him. It was Maka, and she looked upset. With a sigh, he forced himself to put the thoroughly disturbing implications of Stein out of his mind for a moment.

"Everything all right?" Danny asked, puzzled.

Maka stood up and walked over to face Danny. "I just… I wanted to apologize about the way I treated you… blaming you for what happened to Soul and Black*Star and everybody…" She shuffled her feet awkwardly.

Danny looked at her, unsure of what to say. "Uh… it's fine, really. It actually was kind of my fault in the first place, so you don't need to feel – dear god –!" He yelped as a giant furry figure shot up from where it was curled on the floor below Patty's feet and flung itself at Danny, bowling him over.

"Friend!" It was Wulf, back to his energetic, loving self. He pinned Danny to the ground and smothered him with licks to the face. As much as Danny liked Wulf, he began to feel like he was suffocating. He pushed the ghost off and took a few deep breaths. Wulf cocked his head for a brief moment, then bounded back across the room and sat next to Patty, who clapped with delight and began petting him.

"This also your dog?" Kid muttered.

Danny bit back a retort. "No, a friend of mine. I think he's here because he had been possessed by Parasite… he has this power where he can rip portals between dimensions with his claws. I think he tossed me into one of those when he was possessed, and that's why I'm here."

"He's not very symmetrical," Kid commented, eyeing Wulf's shaggy fur with distaste. "And I have decided that you need to return that suit to me so I can destroy it. I cannot stand the sight of it a moment longer. It is a menace to society looking the way it does. It looks even worse than your original despicable attire!"

Danny rolled his eyes and shed the suit, which he had been wearing over his jumpsuit, and tossed the pile of clothes over to Kid.

"Neat logo!" Black*Star commented, pointing to Danny's chest.

Kid looked furious.

"What can I say?" Danny said, shrugging at Kid. "I'm an asymmetrical spirit."

The shinigami made an expression like he could have killed him right then and there. For a moment, Danny chuckled; it felt as if the last day's escapades hadn't even taken place, and he was standing outside in a dark alley once again, faced by Kid who wanted to kill him. Had anything even changed?

At that moment, he heard an urgent bark from Wulf, who stood up on all fours, pawing at the floor. Then the ghost ran out the open door, paced in a circle for several moments, and howled loudly. Danny ran outside after him, trailed by Cujo and Blair – the latter of which had become a cat once again to pout after she was rejected – and then the rest of them. The sun was shining bright… and grinning. Danny blinked.

Wulf raised his claw and slashed across the sky. Immediately, a swirling green gash appeared, seeming out of place in the brightly-lit city.

"Home," Wulf said, gesturing to the portal.

Danny understood, and turned to his group of newfound friends. "I'm sorry, but… I think I have to leave."

Patty ran up to him. "Don't leave already! You've only been here one day!"

"I think that's as much as normal people can tolerate Kid at one time," Liz muttered, but she turned to Danny as well. "Good luck. I'm going to miss having you around." She shot a glance at her meister and sighed. "Oh well…"

Black*Star and Tsubaki were next. Tsubaki held out her hand politely, and Danny took it, not knowing what to say. Black*Star, on the other hand, jumped on Danny and engulfed him in a crushing hug despite barely having gotten to know him. "You might have stolen the spotlight this time… but next time I'll definitely be the star!"

"All – all right," Danny stammered.

Maka also hugged Danny, albeit more gently. "Sorry again about freaking out. I promise if you come back again, I'll be better."

"It's fine, really," Danny assured her.

"I'd hug you too, but that wouldn't be cool," Soul muttered, giving Danny a wave. Danny waved back. He wasn't so sure about Soul. Out of all the kids he had met, he had gotten to know Soul the least well, and he seemed aloof. But he supposed if Maka cared that much about him, there had to be some redeeming qualities.

While he mused, the Blair-cat jumped onto Danny's shoulder, licked him on the face, then vanished into the air. The ghost boy stared after her, disconcerted, and not at all sure what to think about that bizarre

Black*Star whistled suggestively, laughing. "Hey, Danny, lucky boy, that was totally the cat equivalent of –"

To Danny's relief, Stein cut him off by pushing him out of the way. "It was a pleasure to _meet_ you, Danny Phantom," he said, holding out his hand for Danny to shake. Danny returned the gesture, although the sketchy statement resurfaced his previous suspicions. "I have one piece of advice for you for when you return. Watch your back. That is all." He followed the others back into Kid's house, leaving Danny feeling cheated out of a confrontation.

Now It was just Danny and Kid. The two faced each other, Kid with an expression of displeasure, and Danny waiting expectantly for him to say something.

"It has been a pleasure," Kid finally managed to say. "Danny Phantom." He paused. "I'll stop by your place if I'm ever in the area, I suppose."

Danny smiled. "You wouldn't like my house very much. It's in total disarray."

Kid twitched. "I guess I'd have to do something about that, then."

"I'm sure my parents would appreciate that."

Another silence. Then Kid held out his hand for Danny to take, and Danny shook it. But before he could let go, Kid clamped on to Danny's hand and readjusted it. "Symmetrical handshake?" Danny questioned, amused.

Kid let go and glowered at him for the ridicule. "Lose the ridiculous logo." Then he walked back into his house and slammed the door.

"Thank your father for his hospitality for me!" Danny called after him. He received no answer.

The ghost boy could feel Cujo tugging on his pant leg, and knew both his dog and and Wulf wanted to go home; they were waiting on him. He took a step towards the portal, then stopped and turned back around to survey where he had been the past day. Death City. Kid's mansion. He had been surrounded by people who had readily accepted him for being a ghost. It had been such a strange sensation, but… he had rather liked it. At least, it was quite the relief from the usual fear of being hunted by his parents. And, he had friends here now. Would it be so wrong to have enjoyed being with a large group of friends for once? Maybe he could stay for a little longer…

"Family," Wulf's gruff voice reminded Danny, as if the ghost had been reading his mind. Wulf gestured to the portal expectantly.

"You're right…" Danny said, glancing back to where Kid had vanished one last time. "I'm sure I can visit them again someday, but my family must be worried…" He nodded at Wulf. "Thank you."

"Anything for friend," Wulf responded, bending down to give Danny one more quick lick on the face. Not wanting to be outdone, Cujo jumped into his arms, wagging his tail. Danny scratched the ghost puppy on the head absentmindedly.

With regrets, but with a sense of duty to his home, Danny faced the portal and reluctantly stepped through.


	16. Last

"…I can't believe this."

Danny was surveying himself in the mirror with his shirt off, and had realized – to his distress – that there was a long gash in his back stretching from his shoulder blades to his hips… and it had been stitched back together.

"Stein," he muttered to himself. "'Watch your back,' my foot. More like 'watch your back heal from the scar I inflicted upon you.'"

He had been back home for about an hour, and had come back to find that no one had missed him much. His parents had been busy with some new ghostly trinket that would be sure to make Danny's life miserable, his sister had assumed he was with Sam and Tucker, and Sam and Tucker had assumed he was busy at home or ghost hunting. He found this slightly insulting, especially after the people in Death City had treated him so well, but he supposed it was better this way.

Right when he got home, he had made sure he emptied the thermos, dumping Parasite back into the Ghost Zone where he belonged. Danny almost felt sorry for whichever ghostly officer in Walker's jail was stuck with the job of being his warden.

Danny sighed. He missed his friends from Death City already, even though he had only spent one day with them. Death the Kid might have been unusual and a little neurotic, to say the least, but he and Danny had fought side-by-side. He hadn't had as much time as he had wanted to get to know Liz, Patty, or Tsubaki, either, and even his relationship with Maka seemed like it could be promising… but he was home now, and despite his misgivings about leaving too soon, it was a relief.

"Danny!" his mom's voice called from downstairs, breaking through his thoughts. "Dinner's ready!"

"All right," he yelled back. With one last forlorn glance at his back and another curse aimed at Stein for good measure, he slipped on a t-shirt and headed to his family, all of which were sitting at the kitchen table, waiting for him. His plate had already been filled with chicken, mashed potatoes, and salad; it surprised him because his mom was usually too busy with ghost research to make dinner. Shrugging to himself, he sat down and took a bite of the potatoes. Deciding they were too bland, he grabbed the salt shaker and put some on his food.

"So, Danny, your mother and I came up with a new device," his father enthused, the gleam in his eyes illustrating his excitement. "It uses a net of ectoplasm to…" He trailed off, looking curiously at his son, who seemed to be rearranging the salt and pepper shakers with intense concentration. "What are you doing?"

Danny froze, realizing that he had been trying to move them into a perfectly straight line. "Ah… nothing," he muttered, recoiling his hands. Had Kid really rubbed off on him? He shuddered at the thought.

His father waved his hand in dismissal. "No matter. So, as I was saying, I'm going to call this device the Fenton Entangler, and…"

As Jazz rolled her eyes at her father from across the table, Danny smiled. It was good to be home.


End file.
